Lamar Alexander

Mr. ALEXANDER

Mr. ALEXANDER. For the information of all Senators, tomorrow morning the Senate will resume consideration of S. 504, the American History and Civics Act. Under the previous order, at 9:15 a.m., the Senate will vote on passage of the bill. Immediately following that vote, the Senate will resume consideration of S. 1, the prescription drug benefits bill, and proceed to a vote in relation to the Dorgan amendment relating to drug reimportation. Therefore, I inform my colleagues that the leader says there will be two rollcall votes beginning at 9:15 a.m. tomorrow. Following the two votes at 9:15 a.m., the leader wanted me to inform colleagues the Senate will continue consideration of S. 1, the prescription drug benefits bill. Additional amendments will be debated tomorrow, and Members who wish to speak on amendments or the bill itself are encouraged by the leader to come to the Senate floor during tomorrow's session.

Mr. ALEXANDER

Mr. ALEXANDER. Mr. President, I ask the Chair to lay before the Senate a conference report to accompany S. 342, the Child Abuse Protection Act.

Mr. ALEXANDER

Mr. ALEXANDER. Mr. President, I have no objection to the modification.

Mr. ALEXANDER. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that today after the consideration of S. 1, the Senate proceed to the consideration of Calendar No. 140, S. 504, and that it be considered under the following limitation: no amendments be in order, and there be 45 minutes equally divided for debate between Senator Alexander and the ranking member or his designee; provided further that at the expiration of that time, the bill be read a third time, and the bill be set aside; provided that the Senate resume consideration of the bill upon convening on Friday, June 20, and that the time until 9:15 be equally divided for debate; further, that at 9:15 a.m. the Senate proceed to a vote on passage of the bill, with no intervening action or debate. I also ask unanimous consent that following that vote, the Senate resume consideration of S. 1 and Dorgan amendment No. 946, and there then be 4 minutes of debate equally divided prior to the vote in relation to the amendment, with no further amendments in order to the amendment prior to the vote. Finally, I ask unanimous consent that following the Harkin amendment, the next sequence of Democratic first-degree amendments be the following: Conrad, 2-year fallback; Pryor, reimportation; Kerry, grant program; Clinton, study; and Graham, premium.

Mr. ALEXANDER

Mr. ALEXANDER. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Senate immediately proceed to executive session to consider the following nominations on today's Executive Calendar: Calendar Nos. 225, 226, 229, 230, and 232. I further ask unanimous consent that the nominations be confirmed, the motions to reconsider be laid upon the table; that the President be immediately notified of the Senate's action, and the Senate then return to legislative business.

Mr. ALEXANDER

Mr. ALEXANDER. I ask unanimous consent that the bill be read the third time and passed, the motion to reconsider be laid upon the table, and that any statements relating to the bill be printed in the Record.

Mr. ALEXANDER. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Senate immediately proceed to the consideration of H.R. 658.

Mr. ALEXANDER

Mr. ALEXANDER. I suggest the absence of a quorum. I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. ALEXANDER. Mr. President, I thank the Senator from Nevada for his leadership and for his comments. I look forward to working with him on math and science and other education issues. I especially appreciate his commenting on the teachers. He noted perhaps 72,000 teachers. Even though this is just a pilot program for a few years, if for 10 years 72,000 teachers of American history and civics went to summer residential academies, called Presidential Academies of American History and Civics, they should be inspired to be even better teachers. One of the things I most enjoyed doing as Governor was creating the Governor's School for Teachers of Writing which was run by Richard Marius of Harvard. Every summer 200 teachers would gather at the University of Tennessee. He would lead them. He taught Harvard freshmen in their writing program. What happened was, if you put the teachers together, they taught one another. They became inspired. They developed better lesson plans, and they went back to their classrooms fired up and much better teachers. I have great confidence in our teachers. I believe if we afford an opportunity for them to come together in many places across the country, and for 2 weeks focus on how to teach the great stories of American history, that by itself will help put it in its rightful place. When we add to that 4-week schools that students of American history and civics will attend, it will double our punch. I appreciate that sponsorship. I look forward to the Presidential Academies for Teachers of American History and Civics and the Congressional Academies for Students of American History and Civics. Mr. President, I yield the floor.

Mr. ALEXANDER. Mr. President, I yield myself such time as I may consume. Mr. President, this week there was a great celebration of National History Day. There were high school students from all over the country in our offices and at the University of Maryland. Last Friday, when I was sitting where the distinguished Senator from Minnesota now sits, presiding over the Senate, I had the privilege of hearing Senator Byrd deliver an address about Flag Day. Since 9/11, President Bush has spoken more regularly about the American character. Suddenly, in our country there is a lot of interest in what it means to be an American. In the mid-1990s, I read a book by Samuel Huntington, a professor at Harvard, called ``Clash of Civilizations.'' A lot of people read that book in terms of understanding in what conflicts the United States, the West, might find in future years. But I read it for a different reason. It made me think that if the new world order was to be a group of civilizations whose differences began with their cultures, their religions, and a variety of other things that made them unique--it made me think if we were moving into that kind of an era, then maybe we ought to have a better understanding of just what made our culture unique. What did it mean to be an American? I was invited to hold a professorship at Harvard University and taught in the John F. Kennedy School of Government there. And the course I taught was on the American character and on American Government. In that course, the graduate students applied the great principles which unite us as a country to the great controversies which we in the Senate debate--about race-based scholarships, about military tribunals, about faith-based institutions--and the conflicts of those principles. The students were fascinated by that. And then suddenly I found myself, last year, in a Senate race that I did not expect to be in. And like most candidates for the Senate, as the Chair well knows, I spoke about a number of different things. Sometimes I spoke about our colleagues on the other side of the aisle. Sometimes I spoke about taxes, about judges, about education. But, Mr. President, there was one sentence I could say during that campaign to any audience, anywhere in my State of Tennessee, that brought the greatest response. I could barely get it out of my mouth before there would be some response from the audience--of heads nodding or some kind of applause--and it was this sentence: It is time to put the teaching of American history and civics back in its rightful place in our schools so our children can grow up learning what it means to be an American. That is why today I stand before you to support S. 504, the American History and Civics Education Act of 2003, which we will be voting on in the morning as the first order of business. It will help put the teaching of American history and civics back in its rightful place in our schools. It will set up summer residential academies for students and teachers: 2-week academies for teachers-- say, at a university--and 4-week academies for students of American history and civics. And it would join the variety of efforts that the President and this Congress on both sides of the aisle have been acting upon with increasing frequency to underscore American history. It is modeled after the Governor's Schools which exist in the State of Tennessee and many other States across this country. And it is premised on the idea that if 200 teachers go to the University of Tennessee or a university in Nevada or a university in California, and spend 2 weeks with outstanding leaders, talking about the great principles and the great stories and the key events of our history, that they will be inspired to do an even better job of teaching that during the next year to their students. I introduced this bill and support it on behalf of 36 Senators, including the Democratic whip, who is the chief cosponsor, and has been from the very first day of its introduction, which I, as a new Senator, greatly appreciate. It also includes Republican and Democratic leaders whom I will mention in just a moment: The majority leader; Senator Gregg, the chairman of the relevant committee; Senator Burns, the chairman of the relevant Appropriations subcommittee; Senator Kennedy, the ranking member of our committee; and Senator Byrd, who has been a pioneer in supporting this kind of legislation. Mr. President, we need this bill, and we need additional attention to American history because, first, when our values are under attack, we need to understand clearly what those values are. And, second, we should understand what unites us as Americans. Our diversity and variety in this country is an enormous strength. It is a tremendous strength. We are a nation of immigrants with people from everywhere, but our greater strength--our greatest accomplishment--is we have been able to take all of that variety and diversity and turn it into one country--``e pluribus unum.'' We need to understand what those values are. And we need to put into context the terror of the time. I have heard a great many people on television say these are the most dangerous times our country has ever faced. Well, only if you have never had 1 minute of American history would you believe that. We need for our young people to know that there have been struggles from the very beginning. But our young people do not know the story of this country as well as they should. Too many of our children do not know what makes America exceptional. National exams show that three-quarters of our fourth, eighth, and twelfth graders are not proficient in civics knowledge, and one-third do not even have basic knowledge, making them civics illiterates. Until the 1960s, civics education, which teaches the duties of citizenship, was a regular part of almost every high school's curriculum. But today's college graduates probably have less civic knowledge than high school graduates of 50 years ago. Reforms have resulted in the widespread elimination of required classes and curricula in civics education. Today, more than half the States have no requirements for students to take a course even for one semester in American government. That is not the way it has always been. From the beginning of our Nation, we have generally understood what it means to be an American, and that has been a preoccupation of Americans: Think of our Founders, writing those letters, holding those debates, making sure we knew what it meant to be an American; Thomas Jefferson in his retirement years in Monticello taking his guests through his home and pointing to portraits on the wall of the leaders from whom he had gotten many of his ideas so they would understand what he had in mind when he helped create this country. When we had a huge wave of immigration more than a century ago, just as we do today, our national response was to teach new Americans what it means to be an American. Because you don't become an American by your color or by your ethnicity or by being born here. You become one because you believe a few things. If you move to Japan, you don't become Japanese. If you move to France, you don't become French. If you move to America and want to be a citizen, you must become an American. That is the way our country works. We created the common school, today's public schools, to teach reading, writing, and arithmetic to immigrant children as well as what it means to be an American, with the hope that they might go home and teach their parents. That was what Albert Shanker, former president of the American Federation of Teachers, said about the creation of common schools. Then of course in World War II, President Roosevelt made sure that every GI who stormed the beaches at Normandy understood what the four freedoms are. We have not always been complete in our understanding of what it means to be an American. Sometimes we have gone to excess. We didn't teach the stories of African Americans well. We undervalued the contribution of the Spanish to our culture. And in the 1950s, we were embarrassed, as we look back, by McCarthyism. But that is no excuse for what is going on today: dropping civics, squeezing American history out of the curricula, and when it is in, it is watered down. Too often the textbooks are so dull, nobody would want to study them. All the talk is about victims and never about the heroes. The schools have become politically correct. The teachers are reluctant to teach the great controversies. But what is American history if it is not the story of great controversies and great conflicts of principles and great disappointments with not reaching our great dreams and great stories and great heroic efforts? Our students need to know that Kunta Kinte came to this country in the belly of a slave ship and that his seventh generation grandson, Alex Haley, wrote the story of Roots about the struggle for equality and freedom. They need to know that Thomas Jefferson owned slaves and that he wrote the Declaration of Independence, as it is taught at the Ben Hooks Center at the University of Memphis. We are a work in progress. We have never been perfect. They need to know about the Pilgrims who were Christians, and they need to know about the Presbyterians, my ancestors, the Scotch Irish who fought a Revolutionary War because they were tired of paying taxes to support the bishop of a church to which they didn't belong. They need to know about the religious character of our country and about the importance of the separation of church and state. They need to know about our love of liberty and about the incarceration of Japanese Americans in World War II. The response to putting the teaching of American history and civics back in its rightful place in our schools has been overwhelming. Not just the Democratic whip, Mr. Reid, has sponsored this, but 36 Senators from both sides of the aisle, leaders of both sides. And in the House of Representatives, Roger Wicker of Mississippi is the lead sponsor of the same bill. He called tonight and said they have 160 sponsors in the House, Democratic and Republican leaders. I offer my special thanks to a few Senators in addition to Mr. Wicker for his leadership. To Senator Frist, the majority leader, for scheduling the bill in the midst of a lot of other important business and for cosponsoring it. To Senator Gregg, chairman of our committee, for moving it through. Especially to Senator Reid, for his understanding of American history, his leadership, his being here tonight, and his serving as the principal cosponsor of the legislation. To Senator Kennedy, who has gone out of his way not just to support the bill but to attract other cosponsors. He has had a long interest in this subject. To Senator Burns, on the Appropriations Committee, for his strong support. And to Senator Byrd, who took the time to come to the hearing and to testify. Senator Byrd is, of course, the author of the Byrd grants which are already being used in many of our schools. The kind of American history we are talking about is the traditional kind, the study of the key persons, the key events, the key ideas, and the key documents that shape the institutions and democratic heritage of the United States of America. We spell out in our legislation that by key documents, we mean the Constitution and its amendments, and the Declaration of Independence, for example. By key events, we mean the encounter of Native Americans with European settlers and the Civil War and the civil rights movement and the wars. By key ideas, we mean the principles that we almost all agree on in this body: Liberty, equal opportunity, individualism, laissez-faire, the rule of law, federalism, e pluribus unum, the free exercise of religion, the separation of church and state, a belief in progress. We agree on those principles. Our politics is about applying those principles. That is what our politics is about. The key persons, the heroes, the men and women of this country from its founding until today, the scientists, inventors, pioneers, the advocates of equal rights, and artists who have made this United States of America. There are a great many efforts heading in the same direction. This is only one part. The President's efforts, the Library of Congress' efforts, the Byrd grants, the James Madison study, the National Endowment for Humanities which would award these to residential academies, to educational institutions, and nonprofit organizations. All are working hard in this way. We are adding to that. In conclusion, I will mention two things. I was in a Foreign Relations Committee hearing the other day. We were talking about what we might expect with the reconstruction of Iraq. One witness said that we would be fortunate in our nation building there if the three grand divisions of Iraq, the Kurds, the Sunnis, and the Shiites, the geographical areas, could agree on two things: One would be how to split up the oil money, and two would be on a federation that would basically keep them safe and independent in their own areas. And maybe we would have some semblance of democracy so they could choose their leaders. I was thinking about how much we take for granted, how much more we are able to look forward to. There is no chance in Iraq of e pluribus unum, not for the foreseeable future. There is no general agreement on those principles I just read. We have a marvelous country and a great story. We should be teaching it. The last thing I would like to say is the first thing I mentioned: We need to put the terror in which we find ourselves today in context. Those who say this is the most dangerous time in our history have had no American history. What about the Pilgrims who died in the first winter? What about the soldiers at Valley Forge who walked across the ice with their bare feet? What about the Native Americans and the European settlers killing each other's children? That was terror. What about the African Americans who came in the slave ships? What about the brothers who killed each other in the Civil War? What about the millions who stood in line in the Depression? What about in the 1950s and 1960s, when we all stood within 30 minutes of a nuclear missile from the Soviet Union? We have had greater terrors face the United States. This is a time of struggle. It is a time when we should stop and think about what it means to be an American so that we can teach our children and so that we can continue our country. I yield the floor.

Mr. ALEXANDER. Mr. President, I ask that the Senate proceed to S. 504, as under the order.

Mr. ALEXANDER

Mr. ALEXANDER. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for the quorum call be rescinded.

Mr. ALEXANDER

Mr. ALEXANDER. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Committee on Environment and Public Works be discharged from further consideration of H.R. 856 and that the bill be referred to the Committee on Energy and Natural Resources.

Mr. ALEXANDER

Mr. ALEXANDER. MR. President, I ask unanimous consent that at 2 p.m. on Monday, June 16, the Senate proceed to the consideration of S. 1, the Prescription Drug Benefits bill, reported by the Finance Committee; provided further that this order will be vitiated if the bill is not available by that time. I ask consent that on Monday there be debate only with respect to the bill.

Mr. ALEXANDER

Mr. ALEXANDER. Mr. President, I rise today to bring to the attention of the Senate the oppression of democracy and freedom underway in Zimbabwe. A number of my colleagues, including the Senators from Arizona and Kentucky, have led this body in discussions about oppression in Burma. I share their concerns. But as Chairman of the Foreign Relations Subcommittee on African Affairs, I would be remiss not to note a struggle in Zimbabwe that bears at least some similarity to events in Burma. As in Burma, the leader of the democratic opposition in Zimbabwe has been imprisoned by an illegitimate government in a cruel attempt to maintain power. The so-called ``President'' of Zimbabwe, Robert Mugabe, has engaged in a systematic campaign of intimidation, torture, and terror to oppress opposition to his rule over Zimbabwe. Since the elections of 2000, when Mugabe's ruling party rigged the elections in its favor and terrorized voters for the opposition, Zimbabwe has been thrown into a downward spiral. Youth brigades not unlike the Hitler Youth or Chinese Red Guard roam the streets and invoke terror on those who resist Mugabe's rule. The country's infrastructure, which was fairly good prior to this time, has deteriorated rapidly. In the last week the situation has grown worse. A little over 1 week ago, for the second time this year, the people of Zimbabwe stood up and said enough is enough. Strikes and work stoppages occurred throughout the country as many citizens engaged in a massive protest of Mugabe's illegitimate regime. Many rightly blame Mugabe not only for political turmoil, but also economic decay, led by fuel and food shortages. The government's response was swift and brutal. Armed troops descended upon neighborhoods where opposition members lived and violently beat those suspected of opposing Mugabe. More than 800 individuals were arrested, many of them tortured. According to the most recent reports I have seen, about 150 individuals have now been released, but only after paying an ``admission of guilt'' penalty of $3,000 to $5,000. In order to get out of jail, you have to admit your guilt and pay a huge fine. Here is Mugabe's justification. He is quoted as saying, ``The actions are blatantly illegal in that they are aimed at an unconstitutional removal of the country's head of state.'' He is essentially saying that by protesting his rule, protestors are committing a crime. And he is arresting and torturing them as a result. The only crime being committed is the continued rule of Robert Mugabe. Just prior to the first crackdown in March, which followed a similar protest and work stoppage, Mugabe said, and I am quoting, ``I am still the Hitler of the time.'' Let me say that again. He said, ``I am still the Hitler of the time.'' He purposely chose to compare himself to Adolph Hitler, perhaps the most evil leader in the entire 20th century. After that announcement in March, military forces loyal to Mugabe burst into people's homes in pre-dawn raids, raping and beating those suspected of supporting the Movement for Democratic Change, Zimbabwe's opposition party. Torture tactics included rape, electrocution, forced consumption of chemicals and urine, cigarette burning, whipping with steel cable, barbed wire and sustained beatings. What makes these events truly tragic is that prior to Mugabe's actions, Zimbabwe was not a dilapidated country ready to collapse. On the contrary, it was a leading African nation with a strong economy and infrastructure. Zimbabwe's roads were among the best in Africa, and its agricultural sector was a major exporter. As an example of the rapid decline Zimbabwe faces, their GDP has shrunk from $9.3 billion in 2001 to only $5.4 billion today. It has been cut nearly in half in only 2 years. The latest news reports from Zimbabwe show that Mugabe is now actively imprisoning and torturing leaders of the opposition party, the Movement for Democratic Change or MDC. Morgan Tsvangirai, the leader of the MDC, is in prison and charged with treason as are hundreds of party activists. Tsvangirai lost last year's rigged Presidential elections, and has begun legal proceedings against Mugabe because the elections were not conducted properly. I can only hope that Tsvangirai and the MDC survive Mugabe's violent rampage against them. The White House and the State Department have responded to this crisis, and I hope will continue to work to achieve a change of leadership in Zimbabwe. President Bush recently imposed sanctions on the Mugabe government. The sanctions, which began on March 7, prohibit any U.S. corporation from making business deals with Zimbabwe and also freeze any assets top Zimbabwean officials in the Mugabe government may have in U.S. banking institutions. The State Department has condemned Mugabe's actions, and taken other appropriate diplomatic action. The people of Zimbabwe deserve better. They deserve better than a regime that commits violence on its own people. They deserve better than to see their economic infrastructure destroyed by a dictator-on- the-rampage. And they are standing up for themselves by actively demonstrating against this terrible regime. I hope other countries in the region will join with the United States and others in opposing this brutal regime in the hope of bringing new, democratic leadership to power in Zimbabwe.

Mr. ALEXANDER

Mr. ALEXANDER. Mr. President, I commend my colleague, Senator Cornyn, for his remarks. Senator Kay Bailey Hutchison has distinguished herself over these 10 years. It is very appropriate that her junior colleague bring that to the attention of the Senate. She is a Senator from our second largest State. She has been a pioneer in women's rights and advancement by women. When she began her career, as was true for our colleague from North Carolina, Senator Dole, not many legal jobs were available to women, much less positions in the Senate. She has achieved a lot. She is part of our leadership, and I am glad I was here to hear Senator Cornyn's remarks. I hope both Senators will permit me to comment on the fact that some of the best things in Texas come from Tennessee. A lot of Tennesseans went to Texas in the 1830s. One of Senator Hutchison's ancestors was Governor Hall, of Tennessee, just as Sam Houston was Governor of Tennessee before he was Governor and Senator from Texas. So Tennesseans take special pride in 10 years of service by someone we consider, if not our daughter, at least our cousin.

Mr. ALEXANDER

Mr. ALEXANDER. I ask unanimous consent there now be a period of morning business, with Senators permitted to speak for up to 10 minutes each.

Mr. ALEXANDER

Mr. ALEXANDER. Madam President, within a few minutes, we will be voting on the President's nomination of J. Ronnie Greer, of Greeneville, TN, to be a Federal District Judge for the Eastern District of Tennessee. I want to just say a word about that. The President has made a superb nomination. Ronnie Greer is a distinguished lawyer. He knows the people of east Tennessee. He has earned our respect. I am delighted the Senate has moved so expeditiously to consider this exceptional nominee. I had the privilege, as Governor, of appointing nearly 50 men and women as judges, and I know how important it can be. What I always looked for was intelligence and good character; someone who knew and understood the people; and someone who would be courteous to the men and women to come before the judge once the judge assumes the bench. In this case, it is a lifetime position, and it is even more important that the judge have those qualities. Ronnie Greer has all those qualities. I have known him since he was student body president at East Tennessee State University. He was a champion debater. That was some 30 years ago. I knew then he would amount to something special, and he already has. He has served his community in many ways. He has served his political party, the Republican party, in many important ways. He has been a State senator from his part of upper east Tennessee. He has been active on issues that have to do with solid waste and the environment. He has been chairman of his local committee. I think one of the things that most strongly recommends Ronnie Greer is he takes this most important position in what we call in upper east Tennessee having been a trial judge. He will have lots of people before him, litigants before him trying cases, making decisions on many different kinds of things. He has actually practiced law in the grand manner. He has been the kind of lawyer we used to see all over the country, where a single lawyer would try many different kinds of cases. They would have a criminal case one day, a civil case the next day, and a domestic relations case the next day. The lawyer had many talents and was broad gauged. Today, so much of our legal profession is in very large law firms, where we have very specialized lawyers. They do not see big slices of life. As a result, many of them are not very well prepared for a Federal judgeship, particularly a district judgeship where many slices of life come before that judge. Ronnie Greer is well prepared. He has tried hundreds of cases in his career. He has represented the people of his area. The fact the President nominated him and that this Senate has moved so quickly to confirm him suggests his reputation goes well before him. Mr. Greer was born and raised in Mountain City, TN. He received his Bachelor of Science degree from the East Tennessee State University in 1974. He received his Juris Doctorate from the University Of Tennessee College Of Law in 1980. Mr. Greer served in the Tennessee General Assembly as a Senator for 8 years and served on the judiciary committee for 5 years. During his term of service, the committee considered legislation relative to the judiciary, State criminal code and criminal sentencing. This committee approved bills: that rewrote the Tennessee Criminal Code; that dealt with the appointment and retention of State appellate court judges; and that revised the Tennessee Rules of Evidence; the Tennessee Rules of Civil Procedure; and the Tennessee Rules of Criminal Procedure. While in the Tennessee General Assembly, Mr. Greer also served as Chairman of the Senate Environment, Conservation and Tourism Committee for 7 years. This committee considered bills related to environmental issues, wildlife, State parks and tourism. He also authored and was chief sponsor of the Tennessee Solid Waste Management Act and sponsored and cosponsored numerous pieces of significant environmental legislation. Mr. Greer has vast litigation experience in civil and criminal law. He served as County Attorney for Greene County, TN. In his capacity of County Attorney and in private practice, Mr. Greer tried approximately 200 lawsuits in State or Federal courts as sole or chief counsel. As a practicing attorney, he practiced general civil litigation primarily in the areas of personal injury, environmental law and bankruptcy. Mr. Greer has represented many defendants in criminal cases in both State and Federal courts. Mr. Greer has represented numerous cases for indigent clients on a pro bono basis and routinely accepted two to three criminal cases appointed by federal courts per year. Mr. Greer has received honors and awards for his outstanding service to the community. To name a few, he was the 1989 recipient of the Tennessee Conservation League's Legislator of the Year Award and, in 1993, he received the Environmental Action Fund's Legislator of the Year Award. Madam President, I join Senator Frist in saying how proud we both are of his nomination. I look forward to casting my vote for him in a few minutes and urge all my colleagues to support this nomination.

Mr. ALEXANDER

Mr. ALEXANDER. That is correct.

Mr. ALEXANDER

Mr. ALEXANDER. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that the reading of the amendment be dispensed with.

Mr. ALEXANDER. Madam President, I send an amendment to the desk and ask for its immediate consideration.

Mr. ALEXANDER. Madam President, I offer an amendment on behalf of Senator Santorum, Senator Cornyn, Senator Landrieu, Senator Bingaman, the ranking member of our committee, and Senator Domenici, the chairman of our committee has joined the amendment as well, which I deeply appreciate. This is an amendment about the emerging natural gas crisis. It would require the Secretary of Energy, within 6 months from the date of enactment of this Energy bill, to submit a report on natural gas supplies and demand. I offer this amendment because I believe it will help us deal with what I am afraid is an emerging natural gas crisis. If that were to occur, we would be able to protect our jobs, heat or cool our homes at reasonable costs, and clean our air to the standard that we wish. As chairman of the Subcommittee on Energy, working with our chairman of the full committee, I intend to help schedule hearings as soon as possible on this emerging crisis. This report and these hearings should help us take a hard, honest look at what we do short term and long term. Alan Greenspan is usually a little difficult to interpret when he testifies but he was not difficult to understand on May 21 when he testified before the Joint Economic Committee. This is what he said about natural gas: In contrast, prices for natural gas have increased sharply in response to very tight supplies. Working gas in storage is presently at extremely low levels, and the normal seasonal rebuilding of these inventories seems to be behind the typical schedule. The colder-than-average winter played a role in producing today's tight supply as did the inability of heightened gas well drilling to significantly augment net marketed production. Canada, our major source of gas imports, has little room to expand shipments to the United States. Our limited capacity to import liquefied natural gas effectively restricts our access to the world's abundant supplies of natural gas. The current tight domestic natural gas market reflects the increases in demand over the past two decades. That demand has been spurred by myriad new uses for natural gas in industry and by the increased use of natural gas as a clean-burning source of electric power. I asked Mr. Greenspan to elaborate on that, and I will not read all of his remarks but this is the way he began his response to my question on May 21: Senator Alexander, I am surprised at how little attention the natural gas problem has been getting. Because it is a very serious problem. It's partly the result of new technologies employed in the areas of growing technologies and the whole exploratory procedures which embarked over the last decade or so. He talked about our contradictory Federal policies. This is not some abstract issue. The price of natural gas was $3.50 or so last summer. It spiked to $9 or better in the winter. Today it is $6.25 or so. That affects the cost of heating and cooling our homes, but it affects our jobs in a big way. For example, someone from a large chemical industry in our State came to see me a few weeks ago when gas prices spiked up. The thousands of employees there had taken a voluntary 3-percent cut in their pay. The management had taken a 6-percent cut in their pay. They were worried about the price of natural gas which is a raw material for that chemical industry. It does not just affect the chemical industry. In California, for example, where not much coal is burned because it pollutes the air, natural gas effectively sets the price of electricity. So this emerging crisis in natural gas affects jobs in the whole economy, as we have been debating. There are answers but we have contradictory policies. We have plenty of gas but no access to the gas. We have a lot of alternatives, and we are trying to encourage them, but when we talk about windmills, we think we may want a limit on the number of windmills we want to see. When we talk about nuclear, we have very close votes because people are skeptical about nuclear power. When we talk about coal, it pollutes the air. When we talk about drilling more oil, we vote no about going to Alaska. When we consider liquid gas from overseas, we are worried it might blow up in big terminals on the sea coast. And hydrogen we all are for but it is 20 years away. The bottom line: We have contradictory policies short term. This could slow down our recovery and keep unemployment high and hurt our jobs long term. It could mean electric rates go sky high and our manufacturing jobs go to Mexico and China. We need to take an honest, hard look at the consequences of our failure to achieve a balance of natural gas and its alternatives, and I hope this report required by this amendment will help do just that. I will work with the chairman, with the ranking member, to make certain our committee hearings help do that, as well. I yield the floor.

Mr. ALEXANDER

Mr. ALEXANDER. The Senator from Iowa has been waiting for a while. I would like to set the vote for the Dorgan amendment if I may, and then I would be glad to yield to the Senator from Iowa to let him make his remarks. Then I would like as a cosponsor to speak in support of the amendment of the Senator from Louisiana.

Mr. ALEXANDER. I compliment the Senator but I cannot vote for his amendment. This committee has added to the $1.3 billion proposal by the President for the hydrogen car, $1.6 billion suggested by the Senator from North Dakota and others on that side. The issue is whether we want to add to the bill a target that we have 100,000 hydrogen fuel cell vehicles in the United States by 2010. I respectfully suggest that is a wild guess. I drove a $2 million Ford hydrogen car around the block in Washington. I did that, I believe the Senator and several others did, and it costs $2 million to make the car. It actually works. We drove around and got so excited we came up on the Senate floor and put into law that we ought to have 100,000 of them by the year 2010. It is not mandatory. It reminded me, as I mentioned yesterday, my friends were guessing wrong about the facts technology. I respectfully will vote no.

Mr. ALEXANDER

Mr. ALEXANDER. Mr. President, I rise in support of the chairman in opposition to the amendment. In 1987 our family, which included three teenagers and a 7-year-old, visited the Peace Park in Hiroshima, Japan. We thought twice before we took our children there because it is such a staggering experience to see what happened on that August day in World War II when the atomic bomb was dropped. I marvel even more that today Japan, because it knows of the importance of energy, now relies on nuclear energy--the same process that wiped out half the lives in Hiroshima--for peace, for the peaceful production of electricity for homes and jobs for about 80 percent of their electric needs. They are producing about one new reactor a year. In France, as the chairman said, about 80 percent of the electricity, I believe, is produced by nuclear power. We have about 100 ships in our Navy that operate with little nuclear reactors. Yet, for some reason, over the last 30 years we became afraid to start a new nuclear powerplant. I guess we became so accustomed to abundant supplies of coal and oil and relatively cheap gasoline that we thought it would last forever. But I think we have gotten over that. At least it is time for us to get over that and to break away from this national attitude that, since the 1970s, has kept us from starting a new nuclear powerplant. Why not nuclear? That is the question we should be asking. We have heard the testimony of the terrible price increases in natural gas and the projections that we have a really serious problem with continuing natural gas prices. This Senate voted not to go explore for more oil in Alaska. Windmills are promising, but the promise of 245,000 of them to produce 2 percent of our energy and to see them all over our deserts and ridgetops--there is some limit to what windmills will be able to do for us. Coal produces half of our electricity, but it produces carbon and it produces pollution and we have not yet quite developed the clean coal technology we all want. Nuclear power more and more seems to be imperative. So what are we doing about it in this bill? We are basically adding nuclear to the arsenal of weapons we want to use to make ourselves less dependent on foreign oil and more likely to have clean air and a cheap and abundant supply of electricity. It is said that we are subsidizing the idea of nuclear power. In a way we are: A new type of advanced nuclear powerplant that has the promise of building plants for $1.5 billion--much cheaper, much more efficient, safer, to start up that industry, to stimulate it. But we are doing exactly the same thing as the chairman said with wind power. We are doing exactly the same kind of thing with clean coal technology to the tune of $2.2 billion. We are doing exactly the same thing with oil and gas, and $2.5 billion is in the bill for that. This morning, we talked about putting a Presidential emphasis, thanks to the Senator from Louisiana, on conservation. We need to add nuclear to our list. The larger question would be, Why would we keep it out? Why would we encourage every other form of energy and not nuclear energy? I strongly urge that we keep in this bill nuclear power as an option for our future. There will be great discussions in this body about carbon and the concern of greenhouse gases. Nuclear power is carbon free. It is carbon free. There will be a lot of talk about our dependence on oil. The most reliable and largest opportunity to replace oil in the next 20 years is nuclear power. There is a lot of talk about the worry of natural gas prices. The best way to keep natural gas prices under control is to have an alternative. That would be nuclear power. I strongly urge my colleagues to vote no on the amendment. I yield the floor.