[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 150 (2004), Part 17]
[Senate]
[Pages 23304-23305]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                            NATIVE HAWAIIANS

  Mr. KYL. Mr. President, I want to take just a couple minutes to 
engage three of my colleagues in a brief colloquy: Senators Inouye, 
Senator Akaka, and Senator Domenici, to inform our colleagues of an 
agreement that was reached in an effort to clear a group of bills that 
the Energy and Natural Resources Committee had worked on very hard and 
very long, for a long period of time, and have, in fact, cleared the 
Senate and been sent to the House, and to ensure that at some point 
next year, before August 7, a bill relating to native Hawaiians, 
similar to or the same as S. 344, would be considered by this body.
  We reached that agreement, which was embodied also in a letter from 
the two leaders to Senators Domenici and Inouye, who had inquired of 
that possibility, in which the leaders promised their best efforts to 
ensure that a native Hawaiian bill equivalent to S. 344 would be 
brought to the Senate floor for debate and resolution no later than 
August 7 of next year.
  I had told both Senators from Hawaii I would express publicly my 
personal commitment to assist in that effort to ensure that no 
procedural roadblocks would be thrown in the way of the consideration 
of that legislation, nor a final vote on it. I will indeed do that and 
encourage all of my colleagues to work with us toward that end.
  I thank Senator Domenici for his leadership on that large group of 
bills that were so important to so many Members of this body and for 
his work on this particular issue, as well as our good friends from 
Hawaii, Senators Akaka and Inouye, for their cooperation in helping us 
reach this resolution.
  Mr. DOMENICI. Will the Senator yield?
  Mr. KYL. I am happy to yield.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from New Mexico.
  Mr. DOMENICI. Mr. President, I note that Senator Akaka and the 
distinguished senior Senator from Hawaii are on the floor. First, I 
want to say they have been gracious. Many Senators had a part in this 
very major bill, with 24, 28, maybe even 30 pieces of legislation for 
their States.
  I say to the Senators from Hawaii, you had a perfect right to insist 
that your bill, which has just been described by the distinguished 
Senator from Arizona, be in that bill. That could have caused the bill 
to probably be here a long time, the big bill, and you graciously said, 
if we can work something else out, let's try. We did.
  As a result, we passed this bill for many Senators, and we said to 
you, both Senators from Hawaii, we will do our best to get your very 
important bill, described by the Senator from Arizona, up. We cannot 
assure that. I cannot guarantee that. This is the Senate. But we do 
have a letter with all of the people who are in the leadership, I, 
myself, by the distinguished two Senators from Arizona, that we will do 
our best. We described it and everyone knows of it.
  Today we thought we would tell the Senate and give this assurance in 
the Record to our two Senators from Hawaii that we are serious, that we 
will do our part in trying to make sure their bill comes to a vote in 
the Senate by the date they have agreed to and we have agreed to.

[[Page 23305]]

  I say to Senator Kyl, I thank you for your diligent efforts in 
helping with this. Every Senator who got something in that legislation 
that is now going to the House will know what we have done.
  Thank you very much.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Hawaii.
  Mr. INOUYE. Mr. President, I am extremely grateful for those 
reassuring words of my distinguished friend from Arizona and my 
distinguished friend from New Mexico. We look forward to working with 
them next year on this most important bill, a bill for the native 
Hawaiians.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Hawaii.
  Mr. AKAKA. Mr. President, I want to express my sincere gratitude to 
Senator Kyl particularly and also to Senator Domenici for working with 
us on our Hawaiian bill. Especially I want to express my gratitude for 
your grace and your commitment for next year. Again, I want to do this, 
as we say in Hawaii, with much aloha.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Democratic whip.
  Mr. REID. Mr. President, if I may, everyone is anxious to speak 
today. We have an order entered. Senator Harkin is willing to give up 
his time of 45 minutes. He will do the bulk of his time after basically 
everyone has completed their statements today. In exchange for that, I 
ask unanimous consent that he be allowed to speak after Senator Kennedy 
for 10 minutes and then his hour and 50 minutes would be at the end of 
the day. I think that is fair. I appreciate everyone's patience. Also 
following Senator Cantwell, Senator Byrd on our side, will be 
recognized for 30 minutes.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  The Senator from Connecticut.

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