Tom Allen

Mr. ALLEN

Mr. ALLEN. Mr. Speaker, I would just like to say that the gentleman from Nevada [Mr. Gibbons] has been an outstanding member of this task force. It has been a pleasure working with him. I agree with him. As he described the process that we went through, he made a very important point. He talked about all the different, some of the different ideas that are out there and he recognized what we did, which was essentially agree on what we could agree on, and not try to do the big comprehensive reforms that may be good in some people's eyes but cannot generate the support to pass this Congress this year. I really think that is a critical point. As I say, it has been a pleasure working with the gentleman. We still have more work to do before we are done but I want to thank the gentleman for his dedication to this subject.

Mr. ALLEN. Mr. Speaker, will the gentleman yield?

Mr. ALLEN

Mr. ALLEN. Madam Speaker, what a difference a few weeks can make. The tentative agreement to balance the budget and cut taxes sure is different, and better, than the Republican proposals we voted on last month. Even last week the other side was describing hard-working, low-income Americans as receiving welfare if they got a $500 per child tax credit to offset their payroll taxes. House Democrats fought to ensure that they were covered. This is a victory for those working families. House Democrats fought for some new initiatives to cover some of the 10.5 million children in this country who do not have health insurance. This agreement has $24 billion for children's health care. This is a victory for them. Tax credits for education, support for families, cutting capital gains taxes for home sellers and investors, this is a victory for fairness and the American people. We still need to see the revenue projections to be sure that this agreement is fiscally sound, but it is much fairer than the Republican proposals this House passed in June. This is a victory for all of us.

Mr. ALLEN

Mr. ALLEN. Mr. Speaker, will the gentleman yield?

Mr. ALLEN. Mr. Speaker, I would just like to say that the gentleman from Wisconsin [Mr. Kind] has been one of the leaders in our task force and has done an absolutely superb job. Mr. Kind makes a very good point. That point is this. If this Congress, if this Congress spends months investigating potential campaign finance abuses, almost all of which are traceable to the amount and influence of soft money and then fails to act, we will all be embarrassed. I know that is why you are here, Ron, and it is why I am here. We do not want to be embarrassed. We want to legislate, not just investigate. I thank the gentleman for yielding.

Mr. ALLEN

Mr. ALLEN. Mr. Speaker, I rise tonight to talk about the problem of campaign finances in this country. Today is a good day to be talking about this subject, because we have an agreement, a budget agreement, entered into by the President and by the Republican leadership, and that budget agreement and tax agreement has drawn strong support across the aisles today. The problem I want to discuss today is an area where we also have some bipartisan agreement. I have been the co-chair of a freshman task force with the gentleman from Arkansas, Mr. Asa Hutchinson. This freshman task force has spent 5 months working on the issue of campaign finance reform. I want to speak a few words about the problem, and then describe a little bit what we have been going through. All of the freshmen went through the experience in 1996 of going through a different kind of an election, an election where there was a vast amount of money spent in our races to influence our races, either by the national parties or by outside groups that were not connected with our campaigns. So in many ways, we felt as if we did not have the same kind of role in the campaign that candidates had had in the past. In short, there was too much money in politics. Soft money was a big part of the problem. Soft money is the $100,000, the $500,000, the $1 million contributions that go to national parties for so-called party- building activities. A long time ago, when this provision was created, the thought was that this money would go to help get out the vote, to help build the party organizations. In 1996 we saw that money flowing down into districts around the country to be used for negative advertisements. That simply has to stop, because every individual contributor, every voter, every citizen is diminished when that kind of big money contribution is part of the political process. Our task force that I cochaired with the gentleman from Arkansas, Mr. Asa Hutchinson, worked for 5 months on this particular issue. The gentleman from Florida, Mr. Allen Boyd, the gentlewoman from California, Ms. Ellen Tauscher, the gentleman from New Jersey, Mr. Bill Pascrell, the gentleman from Texas, Mr. Nick Lampson, and the gentleman from Wisconsin, Mr. Ron Kind, were members of that task force. We learned together. We held hearings. We had participants, groups that had made contributions, that had run ads, come in and testify. We had advocates for all sorts of change come in and testify. We went through a 5-month process to try to work out on a bipartisan basis what would be the kind of campaign reform that would be significant reform but would also be practical, that could be passed this particular year. We have a bill. It is the Bipartisan Campaign Integrity Act of 1997. I am proud to be an original sponsor of that bill. It does three particularly important things. First, it bans soft money. It takes the biggest of the big money out of politics. Second, it provides that those groups that want to advertise will have to undergo a further disclosure than they have in the past. They will have to identify who the group is and they will have to identify what they are spending their money on, if they spend more than $25,000 in a district, or an aggregate of $100,000 around the country. Third, we will have faster reporting by candidates of their contributions, and electronic reporting in many cases, and more disclosure than we have had in the past.

Mr. ALLEN. I yield to the gentleman from Arkansas.

Mr. ALLEN. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman very much. We have had a good time. We have learned a lot. We have learned that, among other things, a group of freshmen new to this Chamber can come into this Chamber and learn to work together across the aisles. The gentleman from Arkansas [Mr. Hutchinson] has been an extraordinary leader in this endeavor, and other members, Republican members of the task force, have really done an outstanding job. Mr. Speaker, I just want to address a couple of things, in addition. We have critics. No surprise. There are always critics. There are those who say we have not gone far enough. They want candidate limits or they want public financing. To them I say whatever their agenda, however important further reform may be, the fact is that if we are going to act this year, we have to ban soft money. We have to take the biggest of the big money out of politics. There may be unfinished business for other times, but at least we must do that much.

Mr. ALLEN

Mr. ALLEN. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman from Hawaii [Mr. Abercrombie] for yielding me this time, I thank the gentleman from New Jersey [Mr. Saxton] for his leadership on this issue, and I thank both of them on behalf of fishermen all throughout the State of Maine. Mr. Speaker, I rise today as an original cosponsor of H.R. 1855. This bill establishes a moratorium on the introduction of large fishing vessels into the Atlantic Coast herring and mackerel fisheries until comprehensive studies are conducted on the health of the spawning stocks. Several initiatives financed by foreign countries have surfaced which focus on the use of very large offshore factory trawlers on the Atlantic Coast to catch and process large quantities of mackerel and herring. This is of great concern to local fishermen in Maine, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, and New Jersey who are working to develop these fisheries locally. We are all aware of the devastating effect overfishing has had on our ecosystem. European stocks have been severely overfished, accounting for world interest in U.S. stocks. While our stocks are considered to be strong, stocks of mackerel and herring, many in the industry do not believe they are robust enough to withstand the take of large factory trawlers. There is no Federal fishery management plan for herring and the scientific information on the abundance of both species is questionable. Mr. Speaker, we simply cannot repeat the mistakes of the past by overfishing and overcapitalizing our marine resources. This is responsible legislation and I urge its passage.

Mr. ALLEN

Mr. ALLEN. Mr. Speaker, I rise in strong support of the National Endowment for the Arts. Maine is a small State but there the NEA has helped us achieve innovative arts programming. As a former president of the Portland Stage Co., I have seen firsthand how a very small amount of Federal funding helps to support local efforts. It spurs the local economy. In Portland, for example, over 150,000 people a year visit the Children's Museum, and while there they eat in our restaurants, they shop in our stores and they revitalize our economy. In rural Maine, small amounts of NEA funds help musical, theatrical, and other performing groups brighten our communities. Leslie Abrams, one of Maine's best comediennes, put it well: ``A world without art is gray, lifeless, dull. The musicians, the actors, the dancers, the sculptors, the composers, the painters, the photographers, the choreographers, the writers and, yes, even the comediennes like myself, are there to bring color and joyful noise to the world. We help others find what is universal in our experience.'' Support the NEA. Vote against this rule.

Mr. ALLEN

Mr. ALLEN. Mr. Speaker, I think the examples the gentleman gives are exactly right. Those examples do show that the benefits of the Republican tax cut plan go very much to wealthier Americans and that the Democratic alternative, those benefits, the President's plan, go to working middle class American families. Now we have heard a lot of information tonight, and I want to go over some of that information. Two of the previous speakers referred to the Clinton Treasury Department numbers, and I want to talk about these numbers a little bit. One of them said Secretary Rubin developed these numbers, but the last speaker, the gentleman from Minnesota on the other side, was more accurate. He said, ``I do not fault Secretary Rubin, he was not the first to use those numbers.'' That is right. He was not the first. They were used in the Bush administration. For all of this talk of imputed rental income, this way of measuring the economic impact of tax cuts on families has been used for some period of time. It was used during the Bush Administration, it was used during the Reagan Administration. In fact, those numbers, this approach was first developed by William Simon, Secretary of the Treasury, 1977. The Treasury Department has been using this analysis for 20 years. It was not developed recently, it was not developed to have anything to do with the Republican plan in this Congress or the Democratic plan. Twenty years the numbers have been used. So why? Let us ask ourselves why all this talk of imputed income? Why all this confusing rhetoric? Well, I submit the answer is very simple because of another chart that was put up earlier tonight by the gentleman from Georgia, and that chart said 76 percent of the benefits go to people earning less than $75,000 a year. But if that were true, I say to my colleague from New Jersey, he would vote for that bill, I would vote for that bill, all the Democrats would stand up and vote for that bill. It is not true. Let us take an example. Let us suppose you have a family earning $30,000 to $40,000 a year in wages and salaries, and let us suppose they also have $100,000 in interest, in dividends, in investment income. How is that family categorized under the Joint Committee on Taxation numbers, the numbers relied on by the Republican side? They call that family a $30,000 to $40,000 family because they say all of their investment income is irrelevant, all of their interest income is irrelevant, all of their dividend income is irrelevant. We are just going to look at their wages and salaries. That is how they do the math. It is completely bogus. The fact is when the gentleman from Minnesota stood up and said one side is talking about imputed income and one side is talking about real income, what he neglected to say was that real income just included wages and salaries, not dividends, not interest, not investment income. In other words they take all of the wealthy, many of the wealthy, and call the middle class, call them middle-income families, and it is not true. So the question is who wins and who loses under the various plans. And let us for a moment forget about how we described family income. Let us just look at the middle 60 percent in family income. Let us take those at the bottom 20 percent in family income and set them to one side, and let us take those at the top 20 percent in income, set them to one side. Let us look at the 60 percent in the middle. Well, under the President's plan, under the Democratic plan, 67 percent of the benefits of that tax cut go to those families, middle income working Americans, 67 percent of the benefit goes to them. What about the House bill that was passed over our objection? Thirty- two percent of the benefit of the Republican House bill goes to those working families, 32 percent, less than half of the benefit that flows to middle America under the Clinton tax cut plan. On the Senate side they do slightly better. Thirty-four percent of the benefits of the tax cut go to that 60 percent of Americans in the middle. Those are the cold, hard facts. That is why we have stood up as Democrats and said, if we are going to have a tax cut in this country, and we are, and we support a tax cut of the same size as those on the Republican side, but we are saying the benefit of this tax cut has got to go to working Americans, to middle-income Americans. Mr. Speaker, I have just one other point I would like to make. I think we have to decide, is this tax cut bill fair. That is the first issue. The truth is the Democratic plan is fair and the Republican plan is not. The second question is this: Is this plan fiscally responsible? What the House Republicans have done is they have indexed capital gains to inflation. They have backloaded IRAs. The effect of those two decisions is to explode the deficit in the outyears. After you get past 15 years, that second 10 years, this bill becomes fiscally irresponsible. Today in the Washington Post there was a report that we now have driven the deficit, the annual deficit in this country, down to $45 billion; from $280 billion when the Clinton administration started, down to $45 billion. Almost all of that is the result of the 1993 tax cut bill, for which not one Republican voted. The work has been done. We have balanced the budget. This is the wrong time to enact policies that explode the deficit in the outyear. The Republican tax cut plan is not fiscally responsible. It explodes the deficit. It is not fair to middle-income working Americans. We need to stand up for the Clinton plan, stand up for the Democratic alternative tax cut plan that passed this House, and I look forward to working with the gentleman from New Jersey [Mr. Pallone] toward that end.

Mr. ALLEN

Mr. ALLEN. Mr. Speaker, the gentlewoman makes a very good point. Because in fact, the HOPE credit, the HOPE scholarship would be offset, reduced dollar for dollar by the amount of a Pell grant. So here again we have the same situation, where if one gets a Pell grant one cannot get the full benefit of a HOPE scholarship. It seems to me that this Republican tax bill ought to be judged by two standards. One is fairness and the other is fiscal responsibility. We have talked a fair bit about fairness. This bill provides 41 percent of its benefits to the top 1 percent of the taxpayers, those whose household incomes are over $240,000 a year. In contrast, 20 percent of those in lower tax brackets would not receive any benefit. It is simply not fair. Also, in terms of fiscal responsibility, we look out at the second 10 years, and we are going to be giving up $500 to $600 million in tax revenues that is not going to help a balanced budget. We need a balanced budget that we can get to and stay with, and these tax cuts explode in the outyears, they are not fiscally responsible, and they ought to be rejected for that reason as well.

Mr. ALLEN. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding. I just want to refer to a couple of other States here, first my home State of Maine, the Citizens for Tax Justice report indicates that 45 percent of the children in the State of Maine will not get the benefit of this $500-per-child tax credit. A little bit of that is because of age but almost all of it is because of this income floor. The gentleman from South Dakota who was speaking earlier should recognize that the number for his State is the same; 45 percent of the children in that State will be ineligible for the $500-per-child tax credit and it is the same reason. The fact is that this tax credit, this tax bill is weighted very heavily for the wealthiest people in this society. It provides 41 percent of its benefits to the top 1 percent of taxpayers and those in lower tax brackets, the lowest 20 percent, are expected to pay maybe an additional $60 a year. They do not get the benefits of this. I agree with my friend from Florida on one point he said; this is not about protecting the poor. It is not. It is about protecting hard- working middle-income Americans and making sure that they get the benefit, they get some of the benefit of this tax bill, and they are not getting it now.

Mr. ALLEN. Mr. Speaker, will the gentlewoman yield?

Mr. ALLEN

Mr. ALLEN. Mr. Chairman, I thank the gentleman from New York [Mr. Rangel] for yielding. In the course of this debate there has been a lot of reference by the other side to the fact that 76 percent of the benefits of this tax cut will go to families earning $75,000 a year or less. We have heard that number over and over again, 75 percent, 76 percent. It is a bogus number because it does not include, when they measure family income they do not include interest, they do not include dividends, they do not include investment income in municipal bonds, they do not include money from other investments. If you have someone earning $200,000 in dividends and interest, they are listed on the records of the Joint Committee on Taxation here as earning nothing unless they have income of $30,000 or so. The 76 percent is a bogus number. If we look at the Treasury figures, those numbers measure dividends, they measure all sorts of investment income. When we look at those numbers, only 22 percent of the benefits of this tax cut go to families earning $75,000 or less. Twenty-two percent is the real number, not 76 percent. Now, by contrast, the Democratic substitute provides 58 percent of its benefits to families earning less than $75,000. That is the truth. There is a huge difference between 22 percent and 58 percent. The Democratic substitute provides tax relief for working families because, let us face it, those families who get $200,000 in dividend income are earning more than $75,000.

Mr. ALLEN

Mr. ALLEN. Mr. Chairman, I thank the gentleman for yielding me this time. Mr. Chairman, during the course of this debate there have been times when it seemed if the question was whether the B-2 was a valuable plane, whether stealth technology was a valuable technology. That is not the issue. Stealth technology proved itself during the gulf war. We have 21 B-2 bombers. We do not need more. We cannot afford anymore than we have right now. We have difficult choices to make here today and that is why we are here. Mr. Chairman, $27 billion we are looking at, not $331 million; $27 billion needed just for nine planes. An earlier speaker said we need 20 B-2's for 1 major regional conflict and 10 for another. I submit that 20 is enough, it will do the job, it is a good technology, we do not need more, and what we need to do is make sure that we are investing in our training and equipment for our troops, that we are providing the other alternatives that will keep our forces strong, and that we are not robbing domestic programs to buy nine more B-2's.

Mr. ALLEN

Mr. ALLEN. I thank the gentleman for yielding me this time. Mr. Speaker, I want to begin by saying that this is not about our effort to prevent an investigation. We believe in this investigation. It must go forward. We believe in staff depositions. They must be taken. We believe that this investigation should be pursued as far as it can go. That is not the issue in front of this Congress today. The gentlewoman from Ohio began this debate by talking about the importance of precedent. Several Members on the other side have stood up and talked about the importance of precedent. Mr. Speaker, there is precedent. There is absolutely solid precedent on the issue that we are confronted with today. I would simply read from the Congressional Record. The rule adopted by the Committee on Government Reform and Oversight last year concerning subpoenas for depositions, the rule approved by this House said simply: ``The chairman shall not authorize and issue a subpoena for a deposition without the concurrence of the ranking minority member or the committee.'' That was the rule that applied in the White House Travel Office case. That is the rule that the Republicans proposed and this House adopted. It was good enough last year. It is good enough for this year. Mr. Speaker, I would also point out that last year, March 6, 1996, the chairman of the Committee on Government Reform and Oversight, Bill Clinger, wrote to Cardiss Collins, the ranking minority member, and described the precedent for issuing subpoenas for deposition. He said: ``The proposed rule requires that if a subpoena is required in the case of an affidavit or a deposition in the Travel Office matter, I shall not authorize such subpoena without your concurrence or the vote of the committee. I believe that this new rule memorializes the longstanding practice of this committee to seek a consensus on the issuance of subpoenas.'' Mr. Speaker, we have precedent, it is directly relevant, and we should follow it. That is what the minority is asking for.

Mr. ALLEN

Mr. ALLEN. Mr. Speaker, a few moments ago I told my wife I was coming to this Chamber to talk on the supplemental appropriations bill. And she said, why do they not just pass a clean supplemental bill? Why do they not do it? There are flood victims out there who are waiting for relief. Why do they not do it? I think that those who have been following this issue over the last few weeks are asking the same question. Why do we not have a clean supplemental appropriations bill? Because clearly there are people in need. The Republican leadership's failure to pass a clean supplemental appropriations bill has today prompted a Presidential veto. It is not surprising. The President made his position perfectly clear. That Presidential veto is denying our people at home the resources they need to rebuild their lives. Moreover, it is denying our troops in the field the resources they need to carry out their mission. The supplemental appropriations bill provides $5.8 billion to individuals in 33 States hard-hit by disasters. It also provides $1.8 billion to peacekeeping efforts in Bosnia and southwest Asia. Eighty-three days ago, that is when the President asked this Congress for a disaster relief bill, 83 days ago. Since then the Republican leadership has been persistent in forging ahead with a relief bill that is so loaded down with extraneous and harmful positions that frankly that guaranteed the veto. I do not believe that many people around this country understand that position. Why are we loading up this bill? I can guarantee you, I do not think a disaster relief bill, if it came to this House pure and clean, disaster relief only, it would pass without a single dissenting vote. The Members in this Chamber want disaster relief. Civic leaders from Grand Forks, ND, and East Grand Forks, MN, and from numerous other communities have cried out that disaster relief is critical and that every day a disaster bill is not enacted is one more day that Americans are denied the necessary resources to rebuild their communities. I am also holding letters here from Secretary of Defense Cohen and the Chiefs of Staff of the Army and the Air Force which describe the effects on the military of the Republicans' failure to pass a clean bill. Training is curtailed. Maintenance is delayed. Rotations are canceled. Inventories are drained. Our soldiers, sailors, marines, and airmen need a clean supplemental bill. Mr. Speaker, there is a time for partisan politics and a time to set it aside. But when Americans are hit by a natural disaster, we must act together and act quickly. The American people and American troops need our support. We must do our job, and we must do it today. Let us pass a clean supplemental appropriations bill to support our troops in Bosnia and our people at home. There are two provisions I want to mention quickly in that bill that ought to be stricken. One is a provision that would prevent, permanently would prevent the U.S. Census Bureau from using statistical sampling in trying to determine how many people in the year 2000 live in this great country. Statistical sampling. Everyone in this Chamber knows what that means. Every one of us do polling. Every one of us knows that you cannot find out how many people live in a community by knocking on doors and counting. It is a very inefficient way to do it. You need something else, and statistical sampling is the way to go and do it. The Department of Justice under the Carter administration, under the Bush administration, under the Clinton administration has made it clear that statistical sampling is constitutional and appropriate as a way of determining the size of the population. Second, there is another provision in here that needs to go. That is a provision that sounds good on its face, which would prevent a Government shutdown, but in fact it removes the incentive for this Congress to pass a budget. We do not need another obstacle to passing a budget. We need to get down to business and do it. Mr. Speaker, to delay any longer is irresponsible. Playing with other people's lives is wrong. I urge my colleagues to pass a clean disaster relief bill. Only a clean bill will provide the disaster relief necessary and the resources our troops need in Bosnia and southwest Asia in order to do their jobs. Eighty-three days ago the President asked us for disaster relief and we passed a bill that was guaranteed to draw a veto. It is time to get serious, time to pass a clean bill. Mr. Speaker, I include for the Record the following: Department of the Air Force, Office of the Chief of Staff, Washington, DC, June 3, 1997. Memorandum for the Secretary of Defense From: HQ USAF/CC, 1670 Air Force Pentagon, Washington, DC 20330-1670 Subject: FY97 DoD Contingency Supplemental I understand that quick passage of the Supplemental may be in jeopardy. The purpose of this memorandum is to make you aware of the impacts of delayed passage (beyond June) on Air Force day-to-day operations. The Air Force is currently cash flowing over $700 million in support of Bosnia and SWA operations. We are doing so out of third and fourth quarter funding but are fast running out of flexibility and must soon take very dramatic action to avoid incurring an anti-deficiency in our O&M appropriation. On or about 1 July, Air Force commanders must begin taking the following kinds of actions: Severely curtail or cease non-flying training--skill and proficiency levels reduced, e.g., weapons maintenance. Severely curtail or cease flying training--squadrons and wings stand down--aircrew readiness degraded. Cease all non-mission critical travel. Defer further depot maintenance inductions--aircraft grounded. Terminate benchstock fills--aircraft spares and consumables inventories drained. Park non-mission critical vehicles. Place moratoriums on all but safety related facility maintenance, including runway repair. Impose civilian hiring freezes. I know you are aware of the importance of this issue. We are well beyond the point where we can avoid serious disruption to Air Force operations if there is no supplemental. Timing is now critical. Ronald R. Fogleman, General, USAF, Chief of Staff.

Mr. ALLEN

Mr. ALLEN. Mr. Speaker, it is time to stop the political games. The Republican leadership's failure to pass a clean supplemental appropriations bill is denying our troops in the field the resources they need to carry out their mission. The supplemental appropriations bill provides $2 billion to pay for our operation in Bosnia. If we do not enact this bill swiftly, their readiness will suffer. I am holding letters from Secretary of Defense Cohen, and the Chiefs of Staff of the Army and Air Force, which describe the effects on the military of the Republicans' failure to pass a clean bill. Training is curtailed. Maintenance is delayed. Rotations are canceled. Inventories are drained. Our soldiers, sailors, marines and airmen need a clean supplemental appropriations bill. Mr. Speaker, there is a time for partisan politics and there is a time to put it aside. But when Americans are hit by a natural disaster, we must act together and act quickly. When American troops need our help, we must do our job and do it today. Let us support our troops in Bosnia and our people at home. Pass a clean supplemental.

Mr. ALLEN

Mr. ALLEN. Mr. Speaker, the 1996 elections involved more money, more TV ads, and more players than ever before. Not just candidates, but political parties and outside groups saturated the airwaves with political ads. What was the result? The lowest turnout in over 70 years. We know that 90 percent of the public wants fundamental campaign finance reform. We need to get big money out of campaigns. We need more accurate reporting, more accountability and more restrictions on campaign expenditures. Loopholes have become highways for moving campaign funds. Outside groups participate in elections without adequate disclosure of their identities or their interests. The gentleman from Arkansas [Mr. Hutchinson] and I co-chair a bipartisan freshman task force trying to find common ground on this issue. I hope and believe we will come to a conclusion during this month. Then we must pass meaningful campaign finance reform or be embarrassed to face the voters in the 1998 elections.

Mr. ALLEN

Mr. ALLEN. Mr. Speaker, I would like to share with my colleagues a resolution passed by the Maine State Legislature last month on the subject of landmines. I am informed that this is the first time any State legislature in the country has gone on record calling for the elimination of antipersonnel landmines. The resolution calls on the President to negotiate an international ban on the production, use, and stockpiling of antipersonnel landmines, and to pursue an international treaty through the Ottawa process by this December. It also asks State agencies to help, as far as practicable, in the rehabilitation of landmine victims living in Maine. I am pleased that the legislature from my State has sent this message, and I hope that it will encourage legislatures in other States to adopt similar measures. The U.S. Campaign to Ban Land Mines, a coalition of over 200 nongovernmental organizations, is taking this approach to generate attention at the State and local level for a global landmine ban. I appreciate the work of the mid-coast chapter of the American Red Cross, and Julie Groom-Thompson, director of the Brunswick office, in helping the effort to get the resolution through the legislature in Augusta. An antipersonnel landmine ban is an urgent need. Each year, as many as 26,000 people are killed or maimed by these hidden weapons in the ground, and most are innocent civilians who stumble upon the mines as they are plowing a field or walking along a road, often many years after the mine was planted. This means one victim every 22 minutes. The numbers are astounding--Cambodia has some 10 million still in the ground; Angola, 15 million; and Bosnia, 3 to 6 million. While each small, plastic landmine costs only a few dollars to produce, each costs thousands of dollars to remove. The removal costs are daunting, but the related economic costs, in lost productivity and human lives--are incalculable. Recognizing the scourge of landmines, several governments, along with diverse nongovernmental organizations in many countries, have mobilized to institute a global ban on the production and use of antipersonnel landmines. In May 1996, President Clinton announced his commitment to lead a global effort to ban landmines. Later in the year, the governments of 50 countries met in Ottawa to draft a plan to outlaw landmines through an international treaty, which would be ready for signature in December, 1997. This past January, the administration announced it would not support the Ottawa process, and instead decided to pursue a ban through the United Nations Conference on Disarmament. While the U.N. process is an appropriate international forum for this issue, the practical result of this option is to delay indefinitely an international agreement on a landmine, since recalcitrant countries like China are able to block action. The resolution passed by the Maine Legislature calls on the President to endorse the Ottawa process, and I believe this is the right approach. We cannot afford to wait while dozens of innocent civilians are killed or injured each day. I commend the Senator Pat Leahy and Representative Lane Evans for their leadership in advocating for a landmine ban, building support in Congress, and seeking funding for humanitarian aid and landmine clearance activities. I support their efforts. Again, I applaud the message sent by the legislature in my State, and hope those in other States can do the same. I ask that a copy of the resolution be printed in the Record. Joint Resolution memorializing the President of the United States to Negotiate a Ban on Antipersonnel Land Mines We, your Memorialists, the Members of the One Hundred and Eighteenth Legislature of the State of Maine now assembled in the First Special Session, most respectfully present and petition the President of the United States, as follows: Whereas, antipersonnel land mines are munitions placed by hand under, on or near the ground or other surface area or delivered by artillery, rocket, mortar or similar means or dropped from an aircraft and that are designed, constructed or adapted to be detonated or exploded by the presence, proximity or contact of a person; and Whereas, an average of 71 people, the overwhelming majority of whom are civilians, are killed or maimed every day by antipersonnel land mines; and Whereas, the estimated 80,000,000 to 110,000,000 antipersonnel land mines strewn across at least 64 countries cause havoc in the economies of developing nations: refugees can not return home, farmers can not till the fields, relief shipments can not be delivered, herd animals can not approach water holes, health care systems are overwhelmed by land mine victims and clearance costs are extraordinary; and Whereas, the ecological and economic impact of antipersonnel land mines has yet to be fully calculated as they render arable land useless and contribute to over- farming of suitable land; and Whereas, the United States has been a major producer and exporter of antipersonnel land mines for most of the past 25 years; and Whereas, the cost, to the American taxpayers of salaries, equipment, transportation and other needs, of removing antipersonnel land mines was approximately $17,000,000 from 1989 to 1996 and will continue to adversely affect the civilian sector of the United States economy; and Whereas, despite international momentum for a global ban on antipersonnel land mines, a recent United Nations conference failed to negotiate a ban; and Whereas, at the Ottawa International Strategy Conference in Ottawa, Canada in October 1996, the governments of 50 nations adopted the ``Ottawa process'' recognizing the urgent need for a ban on antipersonnel land mines and outlined actions for reaching a ban rapidly in the hope of signing a treaty to ban antipersonnel land mines in Ottawa in December 1997; and Whereas, in Cambodia, approximately one of every 236 people is an amputee from a land mine injury and there are approximately 7,000,000 to 9,000,000 uncleared land mines or approximately one for each citizen of the country; and Whereas, Maine is home to refugees from Southeast Asia, Afghanistan, Africa, Central America, Bosnia-Herzegovina, Croatia and elsewhere whose lives have been and continue to be directly affected by loss of life, maiming and economic havoc caused by antipersonnel land mines, including those that the United States implanted during warfare in Southeast Asia or exported to other countries; now, therefore, be it Resolved: That We, your Memorialists, urge the President of the United States to fulfill his commitment to negotiate an international ban on the manufacture, stockpiling, transfer and use of antipersonnel land mines, with a view to completing the negotiations as soon as possible, by active participation in the Ottawa process by which an international treaty banning antipersonnel land mines will be ready for signing in December 1997; and be it further Resolved: That the appropriate bureaus, departments or agencies of the State of Maine coordinate with and assist, as far as practicable, community-based organizations or groups with rehabilitating victims of land mines who reside in Maine; and be it further Resolved: That a suitable copy of this resolution be prepared and presented by the Secretary of State to the Honorable William J. Clinton, President of the United States, each member of the Maine Congressional Delegation and United States Secretary of Defense, William S. Cohen.

Mr. ALLEN

Mr. ALLEN. Mr. Speaker, on rollcall No. 153, the Drug Free Community Act, I was unavoidably detained downtown. Had I been present, I would have voted ``yea.''

Mr. ALLEN

Mr. ALLEN. Mr. Speaker, I appeal this morning to my Republican colleagues to choose for children. I urge them to restore the $38 million their leaders cut from the President's supplemental appropriation request for the Women, Infants and Children Program and, as we move forward in the budget process, to support full funding for WIC. WIC pays for milk, cereal, and formula, basics that we know reduce low birth weight, infant mortality, and child anemia. The GAO says that every dollar invested in WIC's prenatal program saves $3.50 in Medicaid spending. That is why AT&T's CEO Robert Allen calls WIC ``the health care equivalent of a Triple-A investment.'' Mr. Speaker, when it comes to the budget, our job is to make choices. Republican leaders have chosen to cut 180,000 mothers and children from the WIC Program. I urge the Republican rank-and-file to join the Democrats. Choose for children, invest in the mothers and their children who benefit from the WIC Program. It is the right choice for children. It is the right choice for families. It is the right choice for America.

Mr. ALLEN

Mr. ALLEN. Mr. Speaker, I ask that the Record reflect that this morning I was unavoidably detained on rollcall vote 105, House Resolution 93, and that if I had been present, I would have voted in the affirmative.

Mr. ALLEN

Mr. ALLEN. Mr. Speaker, I rise today in opposition to the committee funding resolution. The majority seeks to increase committee funding by $22 million, or 14 percent over the level that was spent last year. Yet last week the majority cut $38 million from the President's budget request for Women, Infants and Children, one of our most successful programs. That $38 million reduction in the President's request essentially would deny 180,000 women and children the most basic nutrition and health assistance. These Republican priorities are embarrassing. Twenty-two million more for House committees and investigations, $38 million less than is needed for mothers and infants. Study after study has found that the WIC Program successfully increases low birth weights and reduces infant mortality and child anemia. The first 3 years of a child's life are critically important for a child's intellectual and emotional development. Good nutrition is a strong component of that equation. The GAO reports that each dollar invested in WIC prenatal care saves $3.50 in later expenses in Medicaid. AT&T's CEO Robert Allen called WIC the health care equivalent of a triple A investment. It is. Millions more for House committees and investigations, millions less than is needed for 180,000 women and children. Those are the wrong priorities. That is deplorable. Mr. Speaker, I urge my colleagues to vote no on the committee funding resolution.