[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 146 (2000), Part 18]
[House]
[Pages 26539-26544]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]



          FURTHER CONTINUING APPROPRIATIONS, FISCAL YEAR 2001

  Mr. YOUNG of Florida. Mr. Speaker, pursuant to House Resolution 669, 
I call up the joint resolution (H.J. Res. 128) making further 
continuing appropriations for the fiscal year 2001, and for other 
purposes, and ask for its immediate consideration in the House.
  The Clerk read the title of the joint resolution.
  The text of House Joint Resolution 128 is as follows:

                             H.J. Res. 128

       Resolved by the Senate and House of Representatives of the 
     United States of America in Congress assembled, That Public 
     Law 106-275, is further amended by striking the date 
     specified in section 106(c) and inserting ``December 11, 
     2000''.

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Pursuant to House Resolution 669, the 
gentleman from Florida (Mr. Young) and the gentleman from Wisconsin 
(Mr. Obey) each will control 30 minutes.
  The Chair recognizes the gentleman from Florida (Mr. Young).
  Mr. YOUNG of Florida. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may 
consume.
  Mr. Speaker, today we bring to the House another continuing 
resolution, House Joint Resolution 128.
  This one is different than the ones we have been doing. This is a 3-
day extension, so this would keep the government functioning until 
Monday night.
  The leadership of the House and Senate are negotiating with the 
President, and hopefully there will be some kind of breakthrough soon 
so we as appropriators can finalize the details of the agreement. We 
have not reached that agreement yet, but we will be working over the 
weekend.
  I spoke yesterday evening with the Director of the Office of 
Management and Budget, as did my counterpart in the Senate. There is 
movement, but we are not there yet. Anyway, Mr. Speaker, we will be 
working over the weekend to see if we can have this concluded for the 
Members to vote on next week.
  As I mentioned yesterday, there are several issues that are still 
outstanding, most of which are not even appropriations items. 
Nevertheless, they are attached to this bill.
  So, by next week, we hope to have more progress to report.
  Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.
  Mr. OBEY. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself 15 minutes.
  Mr. Speaker, we are supposed to have our appropriations work done by 
October 1. We obviously do not have that work done. As I said 
yesterday, that is not unique. That has happened often in Congress.
  But I think something unique is happening which, in my view, no 
longer justifies voting for these continuing resolutions. I do not 
intend to vote for this continuing resolution, and I will vote against 
it.
  Continuing resolutions are supposed to be passed to give us more time 
to get our work done. When they are passed, we are supposed to be 
resolving our differences. This is now the 19th time that we have had 
to come to the floor and ask for yet another extension of time.
  I would not mind doing that if I thought we really were making 
progress. I have read several newspaper accounts this morning of the 
alleged agreements which were reached at the White House yesterday. I 
have read stories. If I believed that those stories were true, I would 
then feel fairly optimistic that in fact we could get finished within a 
few days over the weekend.
  But in fact what I know to be going on behind the scenes is at huge 
variance with the newspaper stories that I have seen this morning, so 
somebody has fed some information to a number of reporters, information 
which is simply not accurate. I suspect some of that misinformation has 
been spread by design, but I suspect that some other of it has been 
spread simply through honest misunderstandings.
  My interpretation of what is going on at the White House is quite 
different than the optimistic picture painted in the papers this 
morning.

                              {time}  0915

  When I talk to people who are in that meeting, I get wildly varying 
and differing explanations about what the parties did or thought they 
were doing.
  They all appear to be operating from different financial baselines. 
So that when they use a specific number, when one party in those 
discussions uses a specific number, two other parties in the room have 
an erroneous understanding of what that number means. And as a result, 
we get the picture when people come out of the White House that 
everybody has played kissy-face, and it is all nice and wonderful, and 
we are very close to a deal.
  Yet, when you take a look at the actual differences that are being 
discussed, we are still miles apart; and I do not believe that passage 
of this or any other continuing resolution is going to lead to a 
narrowing of those divisions. I think it will lead to a continuation of 
the drift, and that drift is in no way the responsibility of the 
gentleman from Florida (Mr. Young) or anyone else on the Committee on 
Appropriations.
  If I may speak institutionally, I believe if the Committee on 
Appropriations on both sides of the aisle were allowed to work these 
agreements out, we could do so in 1 day. But so far as I know, there 
are no clean signals being given that we can, in fact, do that.
  So I will make a flat prediction. This resolution will pass. It will 
probably have a majority of votes on both sides of the aisle. And come 
Monday, we will be here having to pass another resolution because 
people will have peddled baffle-gab over the weekend without doing very 
much real work.
  I compare some of the numbers being discussed in the papers. I see, 
for instance, that a number of the papers refer to the possibility of 
reaching agreement for the Labor-Health-Education bill at the level of 
$107 billion. There is not a chance of a snowball in Hades that you 
would find a majority of votes in this House for that kind of a bill. 
And it is important for people on both sides of the aisle to understand 
that.
  I am perfectly willing to participate in an exercise which requires 
flexibility on both sides of the aisle, but I know from talking to a 
number of my good friends on the other side of the aisle that they 
themselves would not be satisfied to vote for a bill which came in here 
at $107 billion.
  Now, people will say, well, that is the number that the President 
asked for. Well, if you take a look at what this

[[Page 26540]]

Congress passed so far this year, it increased what the President asked 
for for agriculture by $1.3 billion.
  It increased what the President asked for for Energy and Water, many 
for Members' projects, by $1 billion.
  It increased what the President asked for in the Interior 
appropriations by $2.5 billion.
  It increased what the President asked for in Transportation by $2.4 
billion, and Defense by over $5 billion, but when it comes to 
Education, we are now being told that we should go back to 106.
  We just had an election and the standard bearer for the majority 
party, Mr. Bush, indicated that under Republican governance there would 
be a bipartisan approach to government, and yet the very first thing 
that we are being asked to do is to break the bipartisan agreement that 
was reached on funding levels in the Labor-Health and Education 
appropriations bill before the election.
  When that bill came back to this floor, I do not recall a single 
significant objection to a dollar number in the bill.
  I do recall some quite vivid controversy, as the gentleman from 
Florida (Mr. Young) indicated yesterday, about what were 
nonappropriation items in the bill, language items that wanted to be 
attached by one side or the other; and yet today after everyone ran on 
the idea that this Congress was going to provide the biggest increase 
in education since the days of Lyndon Johnson, now we are being told 
that we have to abandon that 22 percent increase in education funding.
  Well, I would suggest to you that weaknesses in our schools are just 
as important as weaknesses in national defense. I would suggest that 
weaknesses in our education system are just as important as weaknesses 
in our transportation system.
  I would suggest that weaknesses in education are just as serious as 
weaknesses in our farm programs.
  I would suggest that weaknesses in our education programs are at 
least as important as weaknesses in our locks and dams and river 
reengineering programs. And yet, we are being asked to cut the efforts 
to reduce class size in our schools.
  We are being asked to cut the agreement that was reached on after-
school programs so that kids when they leave school have someplace to 
go besides an empty house, because both parents are working outside of 
the home. We are being asked to cut back on the promises that we have 
made in that conference report for special education and for education 
for disabled children.
  We are being asked to cut back on the $500 increase in the Pell 
grants that everyone claimed to be for earlier and that, in fact, Mr. 
Bush campaigned on. We are being asked to cut back on teacher quality 
initiatives so that we can reach the ``startling'' situation under 
which the people teaching mathematics to our kids will actually be 
trained in mathematics, and the people teaching science will actually 
be trained in science, and the people teaching history will actually be 
trained in history.
  Yet, we are being asked to cut back on those initiatives. We are 
being asked to cut back on a good many others from the levels reached 
in that agreement. I am willing to sit down and work out some 
reasonable adjustments in those programs. But I am not willing to vote 
for instruments that enable anyone on either side to pretend that we 
are making major progress when, in fact, we are not.
  And what is happening is that we are being slow-danced to the end of 
the session, when we will be given a choice of accepting a simple 
status quo education budget when, in fact, the situation on the 
education front demonstrates that is not what we need. We need some 
imagination. We need some forward progress, and we need a lot more 
support for some of these initiatives than we have had so far.
  I really believe that if that original agreement was put on the 
floor, the dollar amounts I am talking about, absent the language items 
that were at issue, I really believe that if the dollar amounts for 
education and health care and worker programs contained in that 
conference were allowed to come to the floor by the Republican 
leadership, it would pass with a significant majority, and we would 
have a lot of votes from both sides of the aisle.
  That bill is not being allowed to come to the floor. Instead, we are 
being asked to renegotiate a deal that was reached on both sides of the 
Capitol with both parties. And as I say, in the interests of rational 
governance, I am willing to help participate to a reasonable degree, 
but I am not willing to savage these programs in order to get an 
agreement. I am not willing to pretend that there is major progress 
when, in fact, there is not.
  I want to say again, none of the fault for any of the progress that 
has not taken place lies at the doorstep of the gentleman from Florida 
(Mr. Young). As far as I am concerned, he has been open at all times to 
suggestions and to requests from everyone regardless of party, 
regardless of the branch of government.
  I think the gentleman has genuinely tried to get us to a resolution 
of this problem, but there are other people. I will be blunt about 
this. Every time I was asked by members of the press before the 
election what I thought was happening to the Labor, Health and 
Education bill, what I said was that I thought that the Republican 
leadership was trying to, at all costs, avoid a vote on education until 
after the election, so that they could hide their long-term intention 
to cut the amounts in this agreement. Then after the election, they 
would then feel free 2 years in advance of another election, counting 
on the public's ability to forget that they would then feel free to 
make large reductions in the education funding programs that we had 
agreed to.
  Now that is exactly what is now happening. I do not believe that all 
Members of the majority party agree with that. I think there is a 
substantial number of Members who do not want to do that, but they have 
not been allowed to cast a vote on the floor. And until they are or 
until we can get reasonably rapid progress, I no longer intend to 
support these CRs. I have supported 18 of them in a row in order to 
keep negotiations going, but I see no meaningful progress.
  I see the leadership of the House and the Senate and the President 
each trying to compete with each other in public relations terms to 
show who can be the sweetest in front of the TV cameras or the print 
press, but I do not see any real decisions being made that reflect the 
honest view of a majority of people on both sides of the aisle in this 
House.
  And so until I do, I will vote no on this and subsequent continuing 
resolutions.
  Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.
  Mr. YOUNG of Florida. Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman 
from Ohio (Mr. Traficant).
  Mr. TRAFICANT. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman from Florida (Mr. 
Young) for yielding the time to me.
  Mr. Speaker, I want to compliment the gentleman from Florida 
(Chairman Young) for shepherding through a bill and a process that is 
unbelievable. And I want to associate my remarks with our fine leader 
of the Committee on Appropriations, the gentleman from Wisconsin (Mr. 
Obey), who has stated the facts that the gentleman has done a marvelous 
job.
  I also want to compliment the gentleman from Wisconsin (Mr. Obey) for 
fighting some of the salient points that are important to many 
Americans.
  I take this time, not to belabor Congress, but I am concerned about 
the status of the minimum wage. I would hope that both the gentleman 
from Wisconsin (Mr. Obey) and the gentleman from Florida (Mr. Young), 
although this is not totally in your province, assert your tremendous 
influence to include in that final package the minimum wage that we 
constructed on the House floor, and, if necessary, to even expand it 
pursuant to the conditions that exist in the country.

                              {time}  0930

  I also voted for a commensurate tax reduction for those business 
people who must take on that additional burden of

[[Page 26541]]

the increase in minimum wage. But as my colleagues know, my amendment 
changed the original language from $1 over 3 years to $1 over 2 years. 
I am asking both of you powerful leaders if you can and, if necessary, 
to even expand upon that figure considering impoverished areas like 
mine who desperately depend upon that opportunity. But I know that that 
is not within your province, but I know that you two have worked so 
very hard.
  If possible, I still support a tax cut for America that would allow 
those employers the opportunity to raise that wage without laying off 
our people. But it is very important to me and many Members that 
represent districts like myself.
  So I ask the gentleman from Florida (Chairman Young) to assert his 
powerful leadership that he has, the gentleman from Wisconsin (Mr. 
Obey) to continue to asserting his powerful leadership that he has in 
that regard.
  Mr. OBEY. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself 7 additional minutes.
  Mr. Speaker, I really believe that, what is happening both on this 
Labor, Health, Education bill and on the subject that the gentleman 
from Ohio (Mr. Traficant) just mentioned is a true test of our 
priorities, our character, our fairness, and our humanity.
  We all sit here in comfortable jobs. We fight like the devil to get 
them. We sometimes pay a heavy physical and emotional price for 
occupying these jobs because people are often not very fair in their 
assessment of public officials, and they will use the slightest 
weakness in any human being and try to use that weakness to define that 
individual rather than taking a look at the whole. So sometimes 
politics can be a very discouraging business and sometimes one wonders 
why one is in it.
  The answer to me, for myself, is that I came here because I thought 
this was the place to be more than any other--I never wanted to be a 
Member of the United States Senate, I never wanted to have any job at 
all except to be a Member of this House--because this is supposed to be 
the people's House. This is where we are supposed to be, because we 
have 2-year terms, we are supposed to be closest to the desires and the 
needs of the American people.
  When we come here and cast our votes, these votes are supposed to be 
about something bigger than just the differences between our parties. 
There are legitimate reasons to have political parties because we have 
honest, philosophical, and substantive differences. So we each make a 
choice about which of those two imperfect vehicles is the best in order 
to try to put forward the causes we believe in.
  To me, the glue that holds this country together is our ability to be 
concerned about what happens to every individual in this country, not 
just those who are well connected enough with us to be able to get 
through on a phone call or to grab us on the street and say, ``Dave'', 
or ``Clay'', or ``Bill'', how are you. When we come here, our 
priorities are supposed to represent a judgment about who needs help 
the most.
  The Labor, Health, Education bill is the bill that is supposed to 
help meet those shortcomings. We live in a capitalist system, and I 
think that is the best of any economic system that can be devised. We 
reward initiative. We reward imagination and hard work. Through 
entrepreneurship, we see people with talent and drive help build 
economic opportunities for themselves and for a lot of people who come 
to work for them in their firms or their businesses.
  I salute everyone with that talent. But there are a lot of people in 
this country who need help to get on that train to success. There are a 
lot of people in this country who need help when they fall off that 
train, sometimes for bad luck and sometimes for other reasons.
  We do not meet our responsibilities to those folks when we define 
ourselves going out the door at the end of this session as commanding 
cuts in agreements we have already reached in education and in health 
care. We certainly do not meet our obligations if we do not pass a 
significant minimum wage, as the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Traficant) 
has just indicated. We do not meet our obligations if we have not 
completed action to provide a prescription drug benefit under Medicare. 
We do not meet our obligations if we do not find ways through a 
combination of public and private systems to provide decent health care 
for every person who needs it.
  The place where we come the closest to meeting those obligations is 
in this bill, and this is the bill that we are now being asked to shred 
so we can all go home early.
  I am not going to do that because I do not want to go through a 
Christmas season enjoying all of the pleasures of that season, being 
reminded every day of the opportunity that we took away from people in 
education, of the mercy help that we took away in terms of health care.
  I do not think that is what most Members of this House want to do. 
But if we continue on the course we are going, that is exactly what we 
will do in the Christmas season. That is exactly opposite of what the 
Christmas spirit is supposed to lead us all to do. That is why I am 
voting against this resolution.
  Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.
  Mr. YOUNG of Florida. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself the balance of the 
time.
  Mr. Speaker, I would respond to the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. 
Traficant) who mentioned minimum wage increases, and I would say to him 
that I hope that he knows that our leadership is considering and is 
willing to consider minimum wage legislation, but they believe that, at 
the same time, tax relief should be considered; and that is what they 
are trying to work out.
  Now, I am not part of the negotiations there. I do not believe that 
the gentleman from Wisconsin (Mr. Obey) is. That is a different group 
of negotiators because those are not appropriations issues. On the 
appropriations bill negotiations, sometimes we do get sidetracked and 
get off on tangents that do not relate to appropriations, but that is 
just part of the appropriations process. But anyway I would say to the 
gentleman that he raises an important issue that is being considered by 
our leadership.
  We have a very large surplus. At a time of surplus, whether it is in 
our government life or whether it is in our family life or our business 
life, when one has a large surplus, one's economy is very good, there 
are several things one ought to do. One can indulge oneself in some of 
those things that one has not had but would like to have. Well, the 
government is doing that as well.
  But something else that one should do is pay down some of one's 
debts. If one's credit card bills are too high, one ought to pay them 
off. If one's car payments are too high, one ought to pay them off, if 
one's economy is that good, if one has that extra money available. So 
that is one of the things that we are trying to do here. We are 
indulging the government because the spending for this year is 
increased over last year.
  In the area of education, even at the number that the gentleman from 
Wisconsin (Mr. Obey) objects so strongly to, our investment in 
education is dramatically larger than it was last year and over the 
President's budget request. The same thing for medical research, which 
is over the President's budget request and over last year's amount.
  So we are indulging ourselves. Also, we are making a stronger 
investment in our national security, trying to compensate for the 
excessive deployments that American troops have been experiencing in 
the last 8 years; deployments all over the world that are very, very 
costly, not only in time and manpower and womanpower, but in personnel 
costs. We wear out equipment. Spare parts cost. All of these things 
cost. So we are indulging the government and providing a little extra 
money.
  At the same time, we should be doing something for the taxpayers, the 
people who make this money available. So paying off that debt becomes 
important to them, as it should be important to us, because I agree 
with what the gentleman from Wisconsin (Mr. Obey) said. This is the 
people's House. We represent the people of America.

[[Page 26542]]

  I do not know how many realize this, but in the entire huge Federal 
Government system, there is only one place that one must be elected to 
serve, and that is here in the House of Representatives. One can be a 
President by appointment. Remember, Gerald Ford was never elected 
President, but he served as President. One can be a Vice President by 
appointment. One can be a United States Senator by appointment. One can 
be a member of the Supreme Court or anywhere in the judicial system by 
appointment. And in all of the many, many jobs in the agencies all over 
this Federal system, one can be appointed to those jobs.
  The only place where one will never serve without being elected by 
the people is in this House of Representatives, and so this is the 
people's House. That is why we should be paying attention to 
recognizing that, if the people have contributed a lot more money to 
the government than the government needs, we ought to give some of it 
back.
  That is why we are so committed to providing tax relief for the 
American taxpayer, who is substantially overburdened with their tax 
obligations, and then paying down the debt.
  I mentioned that if one has a lot of money, a windfall, one's 
personal economy is good, one's business economy is good, one's 
government economy is good, pay down the debt or at least pay down part 
of it. That is what we have been doing.
  We have been paying down the debt. Billions and billions of dollars 
of national debt, of public debt is being paid down. That has a lot of 
beneficial effect. One of the beneficial effects is, the smaller that 
debt becomes, the less interest the American taxpayer has to pay on 
that debt. The interest payment on our national debt has been over a 
quarter of a trillion dollars a year.
  Now, can one imagine how much we can do for our veterans, how much we 
can do for our school students, how much we can do for medical 
research, how much we can do for the military, how much we can do for a 
renovation of our infrastructure in America if we had that extra 
quarter of a trillion dollars to use rather than pay interest on the 
national debt. So that is also an important part of what we do.
  But now let us go back to the part where we are going to indulge the 
government a little bit. One of the bills that is higher than last 
year, if we ever get it passed, is this bill on Labor, Health, 
Education and Human Services.
  Now, this bill, when it passed the House of Representatives the very 
first time early in the year, it was right at $100 billion. We have had 
two sets of negotiations. The gentleman from Wisconsin (Mr. Obey) and I 
have worked with our counterparts in the Senate; and in July, we came 
up with a conference report that we thought that the House and the 
Senate would accept and that the President would sign. We really 
believed that. But higher authority decided on one side that it was too 
high and higher authority on the other side said it was too low. So we 
went back to the negotiating table.
  In October, we came up with another package. We thought we really had 
done it this time, and higher authorities again shut it down. But that 
is why we are here, to work out these negotiations.
  Now, the gentleman from Wisconsin (Mr. Obey) objects to the agreement 
that he believes was reached at $107 billion, which is $7 billion more 
than the House had originally passed.
  Mr. OBEY. No. Mr. Speaker, will the gentleman yield?
  Mr. YOUNG of Florida. Sure. Of course I yield to the gentleman from 
Wisconsin.
  Mr. OBEY. No, Mr. Speaker, I do not in any way believe there was an 
agreement reached at $107 billion. I know absolutely for a fact that 
there was not an agreement reached. The White House denies that there 
was an agreement reached at that number. The Democratic leadership 
denies that there was an agreement reached at that number. There was no 
agreement at that number. The continuing repetition of the mantra that 
there was one is one of the things that is going to stand as an 
obstacle to our getting any progress around here.

                              {time}  0945

  Mr. YOUNG of Florida. Reclaiming my time, Mr. Speaker, the gentleman 
just got a little ahead of me because I was getting to that point. 
There was no agreement on the $107 billion figure that the gentleman 
used.
  One area where I do agree with the gentleman is what he said about 
press reports. The newspapers this morning, which were overly 
optimistic, did not represent the meeting at the White House yesterday. 
I agree with him. The information that I have was that there was no 
reason to be optimistic based on that meeting at the White House 
yesterday, whether we are talking about $107 billion, which there was 
no agreement on; there was also no agreement on the $112 billion, which 
is the high number that is being considered by some; and definitely 
there is no agreement on the $100 billion, which is what the House 
passed.
  So I say, in as friendly a way as I can to my friend from Wisconsin, 
that is why we should not communicate through newspapers or media. We 
ought to communicate with each other directly. And the gentleman from 
Wisconsin and I do that. Regarding his concern about what might have 
appeared in the newspaper, he should understand that that is not always 
necessarily the way that it really is.
  Mr. Speaker, we have had a lot of conversation about this continuing 
resolution that we probably did not need to have, but we have done it; 
and now we are going to vote on this continuing resolution. It takes us 
until Monday. I would have preferred that we had a continuing 
resolution that would take us at least until Wednesday of next week, 
because I honestly believe that Members could go home this weekend and 
come back next Wednesday. By then there would be a package that I 
believe would be acceptable to at least a majority of the Members of 
the House and the Senate.
  Mr. OBEY. Mr. Chairman, will the gentleman yield?
  Mr. YOUNG of Florida. I yield to the gentleman from Wisconsin.
  Mr. OBEY. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding to me. That 
is the point that I want to raise.
  As the gentleman knows, because the gentleman was here last night, 
and I was here last night, at 4 o'clock in the afternoon all of the 
leaders on high wanted us to get together last night, first at the 
staff level so that we understood what each other's proposals were, and 
then at the Member level. That did not take place, I think largely 
because there is still such a tremendous lack of clarity coming from 
the top that it is hard to sit in a room when we are being given three 
different descriptions of what we are actually expected to do.
  My question is this. I will certainly be here every day from now 
until the cows come home, if necessary, to get an agreement. I feel I 
have full authority on my side at this point to negotiate. I would like 
to know whether the gentleman yet feels that he has that authority on 
his side; and if he does not, or if he knows of any other party that 
does not in this situation, then is the leadership going to be in town 
over the weekend so that if they want to again second guess our work 
that they can do that with some speed so we do not have to waste 
another 3 days and have to come in here and ruin yet another week 
before we finally get out of here?
  Mr. YOUNG of Florida. Mr. Speaker, once again reclaiming my time, the 
gentleman from Wisconsin, through this entire process, has been here 
when it was necessary for him to be here. This gentleman from Florida, 
through this entire process, has been here when this gentleman was 
required to be here, and that means that neither one of us got home to 
our districts very much this year because we have been here a lot.
  Mr. OBEY. That is why my margin went up.
  Mr. YOUNG of Florida. That may be true. But anyway, the answer to the 
gentleman is, I will be here. I do not have the authority to settle on 
a top number. I think the gentleman understands that. That number is 
going to be

[[Page 26543]]

decided by a higher authority than mine or his, and it is going to be 
decided along with the President of the United States. Now, if that 
number is agreed upon by that higher authority, then the gentleman from 
Wisconsin and I can work out the balance along with our counterparts in 
the Senate without any great difficulty.
  Mr. OBEY. If the gentleman will continue to yield, I would like to 
correct one thing the gentleman said. I do have the authority from my 
leadership to negotiate all numbers on appropriation items, including 
the overall amount. And I would respectfully urge the gentleman's 
leadership to do the same thing on his side. Because the problem I see 
is that I think the gentleman's leadership and my leadership are 
starting from different baselines, and so, therefore, they think they 
are talking to each other but in fact they are talking past each other.
  Mr. YOUNG of Florida. Well, then, I would ask the gentleman this 
question, and I will yield for his answer. What number is the gentleman 
prepared to start at?
  Mr. OBEY. I am starting at the conference agreement that we reached 
agreement on and shook hands on and toasted with Merlot, as the 
gentleman knows. I am willing to come down from that.
  Mr. YOUNG of Florida. That is my question. How much is the gentleman 
prepared and authorized to come down.
  Mr. OBEY. Let us get in a room in 1 hour and start that process.
  Mr. YOUNG of Florida. Mr. Speaker, reclaiming my time, let me get 
back to my point that we would have been much better served if we could 
have had a continuing resolution that would take us at least until the 
middle of next week so that these negotiations that the gentleman from 
Wisconsin and I are both trying to negotiate here on the floor, which 
does not work. We need that little extra time, and we need those with 
that authority to establish that number, whatever it is going to be.
  Mr. OBEY. Mr. Speaker, if the gentleman will yield once again, my 
concern is that the gentleman has just said he does not have the 
authority to negotiate the top number; and yet it is not my 
understanding that his leadership, who evidently is retaining control 
over that top number, it is not my understanding that they will be here 
this weekend. Now, are they or are they not?
  Mr. YOUNG of Florida. Well, I would suggest that the gentleman ask 
them to yield and ask them that question. I do not know what their 
plans are going to be. But I would say this, throughout this entire 
process my leadership has been available to me any day, weekend, 
weekday, night or day. I have no difficulty whatsoever communicating 
with my leadership because they are committed to completing this job, 
but they are committed to doing it in a responsible fashion.
  We are just not going to sit down and agree to $112 billion, and the 
gentleman might as well understand that. He can debate about it all he 
wants to, but we are not going to go to the figure of $112 billion.
  Mr. OBEY. I am not asking the gentleman to.
  Mr. YOUNG of Florida. That is a far greater investment than is 
required for this legislation. I have made the case that we have 
already increased education considerably over the President's budget 
request. We have increased the medical research through NIH 
dramatically over the President's budget request. But we are not going 
to go to the $112 billion that this administration wants. We are just 
not going to do it.
  We have a responsibility to the people of America who sent us here to 
balance the budget, who sent us here to pay down the debt, who sent us 
here to give a little tax relief to our constituents, the taxpayers who 
have been overburdened; and, by God, we are going to do that. We have 
done it, and we are going to continue to do it.
  Mr. Speaker, I ask for a ``yes'' vote on this resolution, and I yield 
back the balance of my time.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore (Mr. Pease). All time for debate has expired.
  The joint resolution is considered read for amendment.
  Pursuant to House Resolution 669, the previous question is ordered.
  The question is on engrossment and third reading of the joint 
resolution.
  The joint resolution was ordered to be engrossed and read a third 
time, and was read the third time.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. The question is on the passage of the joint 
resolution.
  The question was taken; and the Speaker pro tempore announced that 
the ayes appeared to have it.
  Mr. OBEY. Mr. Speaker, I object to the vote on the ground that a 
quorum is not present and make the point of order that a quorum is not 
present.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Evidently a quorum is not present.
  The Sergeant at Arms will notify absent Members.
  The vote was taken by electronic device, and there were--yeas 284, 
nays 37, not voting 111, as follows:

                             [Roll No. 602]

                               YEAS--284

     Abercrombie
     Aderholt
     Allen
     Andrews
     Armey
     Bachus
     Baldacci
     Ballenger
     Barcia
     Barr
     Barrett (NE)
     Barrett (WI)
     Bass
     Bentsen
     Bereuter
     Berkley
     Berry
     Biggert
     Bilirakis
     Bishop
     Bliley
     Blumenauer
     Blunt
     Boehlert
     Bonilla
     Boswell
     Boucher
     Boyd
     Brady (TX)
     Brown (FL)
     Burr
     Buyer
     Callahan
     Calvert
     Camp
     Campbell
     Canady
     Cannon
     Capps
     Cardin
     Carson
     Castle
     Chabot
     Chambliss
     Clayton
     Clyburn
     Coble
     Collins
     Combest
     Condit
     Cook
     Cooksey
     Cox
     Crane
     Cummings
     Davis (FL)
     Davis (VA)
     DeLay
     DeMint
     Deutsch
     Diaz-Balart
     Dicks
     Doggett
     Dooley
     Doolittle
     Doyle
     Dreier
     Duncan
     Dunn
     Edwards
     Ehlers
     English
     Etheridge
     Evans
     Everett
     Ewing
     Fletcher
     Foley
     Frank (MA)
     Franks (NJ)
     Frelinghuysen
     Frost
     Ganske
     Gekas
     Gephardt
     Gibbons
     Gilchrest
     Gilman
     Gonzalez
     Goode
     Goodlatte
     Goodling
     Gordon
     Goss
     Green (TX)
     Green (WI)
     Gutierrez
     Gutknecht
     Hall (TX)
     Hastings (WA)
     Hayes
     Hayworth
     Herger
     Hill (IN)
     Hilleary
     Hilliard
     Hobson
     Hoeffel
     Hoekstra
     Holden
     Holt
     Hooley
     Horn
     Hostettler
     Hulshof
     Hunter
     Hutchinson
     Inslee
     Isakson
     Istook
     Jackson (IL)
     Jefferson
     Jenkins
     Johnson (CT)
     Johnson, Sam
     Jones (NC)
     Jones (OH)
     Kanjorski
     Kelly
     Kildee
     Kind (WI)
     Kleczka
     Klink
     Knollenberg
     Kolbe
     Kucinich
     Kuykendall
     Lampson
     Larson
     Latham
     LaTourette
     Lazio
     Leach
     Lee
     Levin
     Lewis (KY)
     Linder
     LoBiondo
     Lucas (KY)
     Lucas (OK)
     Luther
     Maloney (CT)
     Maloney (NY)
     Manzullo
     Markey
     Mascara
     Matsui
     McCarthy (MO)
     McGovern
     McHugh
     McIntyre
     McKeon
     McNulty
     Meek (FL)
     Meeks (NY)
     Menendez
     Metcalf
     Mica
     Millender-McDonald
     Minge
     Moakley
     Mollohan
     Moore
     Moran (KS)
     Moran (VA)
     Morella
     Murtha
     Myrick
     Nadler
     Napolitano
     Nethercutt
     Ney
     Northup
     Norwood
     Nussle
     Ortiz
     Ose
     Pallone
     Pascrell
     Pastor
     Payne
     Pease
     Peterson (MN)
     Pickering
     Pitts
     Pombo
     Porter
     Portman
     Price (NC)
     Pryce (OH)
     Quinn
     Radanovich
     Rahall
     Ramstad
     Rangel
     Regula
     Reyes
     Reynolds
     Riley
     Rivers
     Rodriguez
     Roemer
     Rogers
     Roukema
     Roybal-Allard
     Royce
     Ryun (KS)
     Sabo
     Salmon
     Sanchez
     Sandlin
     Sawyer
     Saxton
     Schaffer
     Sensenbrenner
     Serrano
     Sessions
     Shadegg
     Shaw
     Shays
     Sherman
     Sherwood
     Shimkus
     Shows
     Simpson
     Sisisky
     Skeen
     Skelton
     Slaughter
     Smith (MI)
     Smith (NJ)
     Smith (TX)
     Snyder
     Souder
     Spence
     Spratt
     Stabenow
     Stearns
     Stenholm
     Stump
     Sununu
     Sweeney
     Tanner
     Tauscher
     Tauzin
     Taylor (MS)
     Terry
     Thomas
     Thompson (CA)
     Thornberry
     Thune
     Tiahrt
     Toomey
     Traficant
     Turner
     Udall (CO)
     Udall (NM)
     Upton
     Velazquez
     Vitter
     Walden
     Walsh
     Watt (NC)
     Watts (OK)
     Weldon (FL)
     Weldon (PA)
     Weller
     Wexler
     Whitfield
     Wilson
     Wolf
     Wu
     Wynn
     Young (FL)

                                NAYS--37

     Baird
     Baldwin
     Barton
     Bonior
     Brown (OH)
     Capuano
     Conyers
     Coyne
     DeGette
     DeLauro
     Dingell
     Farr
     Ford
     Hinchey
     Jackson-Lee (TX)
     Johnson, E. B.
     Kennedy
     Kilpatrick
     Lowey
     McDermott
     Mink
     Oberstar
     Obey

[[Page 26544]]


     Olver
     Owens
     Paul
     Pelosi
     Sanders
     Schakowsky
     Scott
     Stark
     Strickland
     Stupak
     Thurman
     Visclosky
     Waters
     Woolsey

                            NOT VOTING--111

     Ackerman
     Archer
     Baca
     Baker
     Bartlett
     Becerra
     Berman
     Bilbray
     Blagojevich
     Boehner
     Bono
     Borski
     Brady (PA)
     Bryant
     Burton
     Chenoweth-Hage
     Clay
     Clement
     Coburn
     Costello
     Cramer
     Crowley
     Cubin
     Cunningham
     Danner
     Davis (IL)
     Deal
     DeFazio
     Delahunt
     Dickey
     Dixon
     Ehrlich
     Emerson
     Engel
     Eshoo
     Fattah
     Filner
     Forbes
     Fossella
     Fowler
     Gallegly
     Gejdenson
     Gillmor
     Graham
     Granger
     Greenwood
     Hall (OH)
     Hansen
     Hastings (FL)
     Hefley
     Hill (MT)
     Hinojosa
     Houghton
     Hoyer
     Hyde
     John
     Kaptur
     Kasich
     King (NY)
     Kingston
     LaFalce
     LaHood
     Lantos
     Largent
     Lewis (CA)
     Lewis (GA)
     Lipinski
     Lofgren
     Martinez
     McCarthy (NY)
     McCollum
     McCrery
     McInnis
     McIntosh
     McKinney
     Meehan
     Miller (FL)
     Miller, Gary
     Miller, George
     Neal
     Oxley
     Packard
     Peterson (PA)
     Petri
     Phelps
     Pickett
     Pomeroy
     Rogan
     Rohrabacher
     Ros-Lehtinen
     Rothman
     Rush
     Ryan (WI)
     Sanford
     Scarborough
     Shuster
     Smith (WA)
     Talent
     Tancredo
     Taylor (NC)
     Thompson (MS)
     Tierney
     Towns
     Wamp
     Watkins
     Waxman
     Weiner
     Weygand
     Wicker
     Wise
     Young (AK)

                              {time}  1015

  So the joint resolution was passed.
  The result of the vote was announced as above recorded.
  A motion to reconsider was laid on the table.
  Stated for:
  Mr. FILNER. Mr. Speaker, on rollcall No. 602, I was in my 
Congressional District on official business. Had I been present, I 
would have voted ``yea.''
  Mr. BURTON of Indiana. Mr. Speaker, during rollcall vote No. 602, I 
was unavoidably detained. Had I been here I would have voted ``yea.''

                          ____________________