Joe Barton

Mr. BARTON of Texas

Mr. BARTON of Texas. Mr. Speaker, when we are little boys or little girls, people ask us, ``What do you want to do when you grow up?'' Most of us say we want to do something, whatever our parents are doing, our mother or our father, or we maybe want to be a policeman or a fireman or a baseball star or a football star. A lot of people say they want to be astronauts, because astronauts are heroes. When I was growing up in Texas, one of the things I thought about being was an astronaut. But there are so few that not many of us get to actually have that kind of a dream. This past Saturday, six American citizens and one Israeli citizen who were living that dream found that it came to a crashing end when, upon reentry, Columbia Mission STS-107 came apart. We are here today to first of all pay tribute to those brave seven astronauts who gave their lives pursuing their dream but in a larger sense pursuing humanity's dream, to find new knowledge, to reach out into space, to reach out into the future. I was one of the 40 or 50 Congressmen and Senators who went to Houston yesterday to participate in the memorial ceremony. The gentleman from California (Mr. Rohrabacher) was there, the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Green) was there, the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Hall) was there, some of the Members that are in the Chamber right now. When we got there, they took us up to the sixth floor of the administration building, and they put us in the briefing room that the administrator uses to be briefed on these missions. Around the upper walls, they had a patch of every shuttle mission with a brief summary, from STS-1. They had not put this one up yet because it was not complete. And then down on boards they had the profiles for the missions for this year. They had STS-107 and they had, launch, January 16, the number of people in the mission, the seven astronauts and the payload and the number of orbits and how high it was going to be above the Earth, 150 nautical miles, and what its degrees of entry was when it came back, 39 degrees. That mission will never be completed in the physical sense. But it could be completed in the historical sense if we as a Congress and we as a country carefully think about how to honor their memory and how to continue the work that they gave their lives for. A 2 percent accident rate is unacceptable. Even though it is an experimental program, we can cannot have a 2 percent risk that every time we put a shuttle up lives will be lost. So one of the things we have to do is conduct this investigation, if at all possible find the cause of the accident and prevent it, but we also have to begin to look at a substitute for the existing shuttle fleet. I was on the committee in 1987 when we did the investigation, and we talked about going to new technology then, but we decided not to for two reasons, the cost and the fact that the existing shuttle fleet was still relatively young. That was 17 years ago. This time around I think we need, as a part of the investigation, to consider taking the next step, not using '50s and '60s and '70s technology. Let us use 2000 and 2005 technology. We also need to reevaluate the mission of NASA. If our mission to have manned space activity is simply the space station, in my opinion that is not a sufficient mission. President Kennedy said in the early '60s, we will land an American on the moon by 1970. We did it in July of 1969. I would hope that we would take this opportunity to look at our mission. Perhaps we want to land a man on Mars by 2020. Perhaps we want to have a full-time colony on the moon by 2050. But we need to reevaluate the mission of NASA. We need to give our children and our grandchildren a vision for what America is all about, and in my opinion part of that vision is an aggressive space program with men and women in space carrying the American flag. God bless our seven astronauts and their families, and God bless America.

Mr. BARTON of Texas

Mr. BARTON of Texas. Once we get our work done this week, we are home for the holidays?

Mr. BARTON of Texas. Mr. Speaker, I want to thank the gentleman for his excellent leadership and friendship and join all the others in wishing him well in whatever his future endeavors are.

Mr. BARTON of Texas. Mr. Speaker, as the distinguished gentleman knows, I have made an art form of giving you grief on the schedule, so I am going to continue to do that. Is it the gentleman's intention that once we adjourn for this week or weekend, that we do not come back until the next Congress? Is that the intention of the leadership?

Mr. BARTON of Texas. Mr. Speaker, will the gentleman yield?

Mr. BARTON of Texas

Mr. BARTON of Texas. Mr. Speaker, we all stand in this Chamber once every 2 years in January and hold up our right hands and take an oath to defend the Constitution of the United States of America and defend our great Nation against all enemies, foreign and domestic. That same Constitution that we swear an oath to defend gives the President of the United States the right to serve as Commander-in-Chief and to also conduct foreign policy. Today, our President has come before the Congress and asked us to support a resolution so that he can conduct foreign policy and that if he needs to serve as Commander-in-Chief, defend our Nation against an enemy who is both foreign and domestic. Because Saddam Hussein, as leader of Iraq, has engaged in terrorism, has sponsored terrorism, has said repeatedly that he wants to do the United States of America harm. Some would have us believe that we should not take Saddam Hussein at his word, that we can continue to use diplomatic means to try to get him to back away from developing biological weapons and chemical weapons and to get him to back away from calling the United States the Great Satan, things of this sort. It has not worked in the 11 years since we were last in the Middle East; there is no reason to expect that it would work today. But that is an option. Others would have us believe that if we just go to the United Nations and get one more resolution, one more sanctions resolution, that somehow Saddam Hussein, although he has violated repeatedly every other U.N. resolution, one more U.N. resolution he might honor. The proof is in the pudding. If we wait for the U.N. resolution, there is a probability, almost a certainty, that our great Nation will probably be subjected to some sort of an act of terrorism that is in fact orchestrated by Saddam Hussein. So I think the President is right when he says that he wants to work with the U.N., he wants to get international cooperation. But the fact of the matter is that the Constitution that we swore an oath to defend says we have to protect our great Nation against all enemies, foreign and domestic. We cannot wait for diplomatic means; we cannot wait for U.N. resolutions that might or might not have an effect in the future. What should we do? We should vote for this resolution. What if we do not? Well, Iraq has used chemical weapons in the war against Iran. It has used biological weapons in the war against Iran. It has developed at least six chemical weapons and eight biological weapons. It is developing the means to develop a nuclear weapon. It is developing the means to transport these biological and chemical weapons by bomb and by missile. So I think the time is now to act. I think we vote for the resolution. We show the President of the United States we will support him as Commander in Chief, if need be. He certainly has conducted our foreign policy. We prepare for the worst; but, hopefully, by doing this, we will yet engender some solution that does not require the use of military force. But if it does, as the resolution says, we should give the President that right. So I intend to vote ``yes'' on the resolution, ``no'' on the Democratic substitute, and hope we can move in a unified way to support President Bush and defend our Nation as we said we would when we took the oath of office when we stood up here in January of 2 years ago.

Mr. BARTON of Texas

Mr. BARTON of Texas. Mr. Chairman, I thank the gentleman for yielding me the time. Mr. Chairman, let us set one thing straight. Nobody that opposes the amendment to strike the language that is before us at this point in time is trying to take the pressure off of any airport to not implement tough baggage screening processes. The point of the fact is the major hub airports simply cannot meet it. I have Dallas/Ft. Worth Airport in my congressional district. Over 100,000 people go through that airport every day. Fifty-five thousand bags are checked every day. DFW and their management team have been working with TSA since the law was passed. TSA has yet to give them a definite answer on their solution. There is a backlog of equipment that cannot be put in place. If we have to meet the deadline, do my colleagues know what DFW is going to do, they are going to have to hire 1,500 temporary employees. They are going to have to put up folding tables. They are going to have check by hand almost every bag that comes in to be checked. That is going to be long lines. It is going to cost $142 million just at DFW, and they are still going to have to come in with a permanent solution within the next year that is going to cost another $150- to $170 million. Why not give them a little extra time? They still have to be working on the solution. They still have to try to get it done, but if they do not, there are not going to be any penalties imposed. There are not enough equipment manufacturers to meet the sophisticated equipment for the larger hub airports that have to be in place if we literally tried to get it all done by December 31. Let me give my colleagues an example. As of today, of the 429 airports that are subject to the existing law, only 24, one out of five, 5 percent have had a complete TSA inspection and had the sign-off on the plan. There are another 129 airports that have had some negotiations, some contacts with TSA. That means that 64 percent of the Nation's airports that TSA has not even come to the airport yet, and we want them to meet this arbitrary deadline by December 31? It is physically impossible and philosophically unnecessary. Vote against the Oberstar amendment.

Mr. BARTON of Texas

Mr. BARTON of Texas. Mr. Speaker, I also want to rise in strong support of H.R. 3609, the Pipeline Infrastructure Protection to Enhance Security and Safety Act. It is comprehensive, bipartisan, multi- committee, and widely supported. It will reauthorize our pipeline safety laws through 2006 which, in my opinion, is a tremendous accomplishment. I want to add my commendations to my full committee chairman, the gentleman from Louisiana (Mr. Tauzin), and the ranking member, the gentleman from Michigan (Mr. Dingell). I compliment the gentleman from Alaska (Mr. Young), the chairman of the Committee on Transportation and Infrastructure, along with the gentleman from Minnesota (Mr. Oberstar). I would also thank the subcommittee chairman, the gentleman from Wisconsin (Mr. Petri), the gentleman from Pennsylvania (Mr. Borski), the ranking member, and the gentleman from Virginia (Mr. Boucher), the ranking member on my subcommittee. We all worked very hard to make it possible to come out and pat each other on the back this evening. The bill before us is an agreement that we have worked on in both committees. Both of our committees reported a pipeline safety bill earlier this year. It has a new landmark section on integrity management for natural gas transmission lines. It has a baseline integrity assessment of 7 years and periodic reinspections every 10 years. We have a tough but very manageable requirement for pipeline infrastructure. This balance requirement, in my opinion, appears to be a much more appropriate inspection regime than is currently in the bill which passed the other body. The pipeline infrastructure for delivering natural gas and liquid petroleum is more important than ever for our great Nation. The demand for natural gas and gasoline will likely continue to rise, and our pipelines will have a more and more important role each day in supplying those commodities. Pipeline transportation is among the cheapest and safest methods of transport. We need to make sure that our pipelines are safe and managed well. We also want States and our local communities to be comfortable that future pipelines which will be needed are good things for their region, and that they are operated as safely as possible. Today's agreement includes changes to the one-call notification programs, a new national toll-free number suggested by the gentleman from Louisiana (Mr. John), a member of my subcommittee. It has an important integrity research and development program which was authored by the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Hall) who is also the ranking member of the Committee on Science. It includes important coordination of environmental reviews by Federal agencies to streamline the process for permitting repairs. Finally, I commend all of the staffs for their hard work on this bill, especially from our committee, Bill Cooper and Andy Black of the majority, and Rick Kessler of the minority for their hard work. The bill is supported by environmental groups, labor groups and industry associations and many local community groups. It has the support of the majority and the minority of every committee involved in the discussions. I hope that we will pass this by unanimous consent in the very near future.

Mr. BARTON of Texas

Mr. BARTON of Texas. A friendly inquiry, Mr. Chairman. I am reading the underlying bill. In the bill that is on the floor, section 128, which has the section that the gentleman was alluding to that would give TSA the authority to do the rule, it is repealed.

Mr. BARTON of Texas. It is to be replaced?

Mr. BARTON of Texas. Mr. Chairman, will the gentleman yield?

Mr. BARTON of Texas. Mr. Chairman, I want to commend the Committee on Transportation and Infrastructure for bringing this bill to the floor. I want to commend the ranking member, the full committee chairman, the ranking subcommittee member, and the subcommittee chairman for this. It is an excellent piece of legislation, but, like most bills, it can be improved. The district that I represent down in Texas includes D-FW airport, which is one of the hub airports in our great Nation. I am very close to Love Field, which is the hub airport for Southwest Airlines. I could be proven wrong on this, but I guess my estimate is that there are more pilots who live in my congressional district than any other district in the country. As soon as we had the terrible tragedy back in September, my pilots began to come to me personally and collectively and in town meetings saying that they would like to have the right to carry a firearm in the cockpit. I support that right. It is guaranteed under the Constitution, the Second Amendment. We have had several pieces of legislation that have passed since September 11, and there have been numerous ways to try to give that right to the pilots. The underlying bill before us would allow that in a limited fashion. The amendment that is sponsored by the gentleman from Oregon (Mr. DeFazio), myself, the gentleman from South Dakota (Mr. Thune), and the gentleman from Washington (Mr. Nethercutt) would remove that 2 percent cap, it would make the program permanent, and it would accelerate the training of qualified pilots. I would like to point out that this is a voluntary program. We are not forcing a pilot to carry a weapon if he or she feels that they do not need to or do not want to. The pilots have to be trained. The pilots have to be certified. But as someone who has flown over 3 million miles, air miles on commercial airliners since I became a United States Representative in 1985, I can tell Members that as a passenger, I feel more comfortable if I know that the pilots at a minimum have the right to carry a weapon, and hopefully, are carrying that weapon and exercising that right. It makes the terrorists' job that much more difficult, should they in some way gain entry into the airplane or into the cockpit. Most of our pilots are former military flyers, so they are very comfortable with firearms. Again, they have to be trained. I think this is an excellent amendment. I would point out that a survey that was done back in October by the Air Line Pilots Association and by United Seniors Association, USA, this was done by the Winston Group in October of 2001, shows that 75 percent of Americans favor arming airline pilots, and 49 percent say they would switch to an airline that allows its pilots to be armed. More than half said they would be willing to pay extra to fly on a plane where they knew the pilot had a firearm. Interestingly enough, 78 percent of married women with children would support arming our pilots, and 77 percent of adults over 55. So at least in this survey taken last fall, there was overwhelming support. I believe, if this amendment comes to a roll call vote, we will see overwhelming support on the House floor. I want to commend the gentleman from South Dakota (Mr. Thune), the gentleman from Oregon (Mr. DeFazio), and the gentleman from Washington (Mr. Nethercutt) for working with me to bring forth this amendment, and I hope we adopt it expeditiously. Mr. Chairman, I include for the Record information on the survey I referred to earlier. The document referred to is as follows: Allied Pilots Association, United Seniors Association, October 17, 2001. New National Survey Shows Overwhelming Public Support for Arming Airline Pilots support strongest among women, seniors; travelers would switch to airlines that arm its pilots Washington, DC.--A new national survey commissioned by the Allied Pilots Association and United Seniors Association and conducted by The Winston Group, will be released today, Wednesday, October 17, 2001. The survey reveals the biggest concerns of airline passengers and what security measures the government needs to take now to reassure the traveling public that it is again safe to fly. 75% of Americans favor arming airline pilots. 49% of those surveyed would switch to an airline that armed its pilots. More than half (51%) would be willing to pay up to $25 per ticket to pay for new security measures. 78% of married women with children support arming airline pilots. 77% of adults 55 and older support arming airline pilots. The Airline Passenger Security Survey was conducted October 9-10, 2001 with 800 registered voters across the nation. Margin of error is +/-3.46 Last week, the United States Senate passed the Aviation Security Act and the U.S. House of Representatives will be debating these issues shortly. ``We hope the House considers these important views of American people when crafting their bill on airline security,'' said Charlie Jarvis, President and CEO of United Seniors Association.

Mr. BARTON of Texas. Mr. Chairman, I move to strike the requisite number of words. (Mr. BARTON of Texas asked and was given permission to revise and extend his remarks.)

Mr. BARTON of Texas. Mr. Chairman, I demand a recorded vote.

Mr. BARTON of Texas

Mr. BARTON of Texas. Mr. Speaker, I rise in support of the rule, even though I had an amendment that I would have liked to have offered that was not made in order on prescription drug savings accounts. This is not the fairest rule. We could have made in order a Democratic alternative. But for a first start, I think it is a fair enough rule. This is a good plan that will be on the floor. It spends $350 billion over 10 years to provide a prescription drug benefit and some Medicare reforms for the providers. The drug benefit comes to a population where we have about 30 million senior citizens on Medicare, and 70 percent of those seniors have some prescription drug coverage under private medigap policies. Of those that do not have any prescription drug benefits, 50 percent of them have drug costs that are less than $1,000 a year, and only about 700,000 have drug costs that are over $5,000 a year. Now, if you are one of those 700,000 or it is your mother or your father, your grandmother, your grandfather, your aunt or your uncle, that is a big problem. But to say that a prescription drug benefit that is going to provide $31 billion a year to provide coverage for prescription drugs is not at least a good start, I think is just flat hypocritical. Now, I think we can do more. I would like for us to do more. I would like to, at some point in time, make in order an option for those that want to use a prescription drug savings account to have that option; and, hopefully, later this year, we will get that. I would point out that if the plan that is before us were to become law and it is a bad plan, it is optional. There is nothing mandatory about this plan that is going to be on the floor. I would also point out that the provider benefits in the bill, which are over $4 billion a year, there is almost universal support for in the provider community. So this is a good start. I would hope we would vote for the rule and have the debate.

Mr. BARTON of Texas. Mr. Speaker, I want to thank my distinguished chairman and simply tell him I am glad to be on the floor backing him up, and I look forward to tomorrow delivering one of his famous cookbooks to one of my dearest friends down in Texas who has indicated to me you need to be backed up tonight with great, great enthusiasm. I would like to tell my good Democratic friends that I agree with them on one point, and that is the fact that the rule should have allowed you to offer your substitute. I think it would have been a neat trick to have almost to a person voted against an increase in the debt ceiling of $450 billion and then turn right around and voted for a $1 trillion expansion of a brand new entitlement program 2 hours later. I think this is a good bill. The provider part of it is almost universally supported. I think the prescription drug benefit is a good start. I think it could be improved. I would like at some point in time to have the ability to offer the additional option of a prescription drug savings account. Many in my district, over two-thirds of the seniors that I have talked to, have said that they would probably opt for some sort of a drug savings account if they were given that option, and I hope that later this year we could do that. This bill that is before us for over half of the seniors in this country would pay nothing for prescription drugs except a small copayment for the specific drug that they had to use, and I would point out that prescription drugs for most of our seniors are not of a catastrophic nature. They are of a chronic nature. They are to treat heart disease or to treat high blood pressure or cholesterol. They are something they have to take to have a lifestyle that we want them to have. So I think my idea of a prescription drug savings account would give them a lot of options to do that, and again, I hope that we have the opportunity to offer that at some point in time. To start the ball rolling, I agree that this bill is a good start and hope we will vote for it later this evening.

Mr. BARTON of Texas

Mr. BARTON of Texas. Mr. Speaker, I want to ask a parliamentary inquiry. We are now debating the motion to instruct conferees; is that correct?

Mr. BARTON of Texas. Mr. Speaker, reclaiming my time, we will stipulate that the gentleman's coal is clean. We might want to point out that coal in general has sizably larger emissions of VOCs than some of my dirty natural gas. It is about 95 percent, maybe 96 percent cleaner. We are going to work to clean up all energy sources. I would also hope that we will help to revitalize the nuclear industry which has no emissions.

Mr. BARTON of Texas. Mr. Speaker, the gentleman from Massachusetts (Mr. Markey) has 15 minutes and I have 15 minutes?

Mr. BARTON of Texas. Mr. Speaker, I am sure we can do this in less than an hour, I would hope. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume. I want to compliment my excellent and good friend from Massachusetts for offering this motion to instruct conferees. It is obvious that some thought has gone into it. I do not believe anybody on our side of the aisle is for deficit financing or deficit spending, and obviously we worked very hard, as the gentleman from Massachusetts would, I think, acknowledge, to create a bipartisan bill, H.R. 4, that we are sending to conference. I think after we have a little debate to flush out what exactly it is this motion to instruct conferees is attempting to do, I am going to recommend that we accept it. I do not see any reason we cannot agree, going to conference, to try to make sure the American people know that we want an energy policy for this country that is based on a balanced approach both on the production side and on the consumption side, and in no way are we trying to create through the guise of an energy policy a bill that would increase the public debt. Having said that, I think we need to make a few points in order so that the Members that are in their offices watching this debate on television and other interested citizens understand that the energy bill that we are sending to conference is an authorization bill. It is not a spending bill. It is not an appropriation bill. So in one sense it has nothing to do with deficit spending or any other thing like that. It is trying to list a series of priorities for this country in terms of an energy policy. Historically, the United States of America has adopted, as a general policy, that our energy policy is going to be based on free markets, where we attract private capital. We employ that private capital in the most cost-efficient fashion and allow private entrepreneurs to provide energy at the least cost of any industrialized society in the world. Because of that, the United States has the world's largest gross national product. We have the world's largest standard of living for a large industrialized nation, and we have tremendous opportunities, as we speak, for our children and our grandchildren. So if the gentleman from Massachusetts (Mr. Markey) wants to say that as we go to work on a bipartisan basis for an energy policy for the present and the future that we try to ensure that our House conferees work to insist that it is all done in a cost-effective fashion and does not increase the national debt, I for one am going to endorse that and I would assume that in the absence of Chairman Tauzin, what I say goes on this floor unless the Speaker sends me an urgent message to run the other way in which I would have to attack my good friend from Massachusetts (Mr. Markey) and try to impugn him, and I am not going to do that because I know he is a decent fellow at heart and has got the national interest. So with that, Mr. Speaker, I would simply say that we are going to start this conference on a bipartisan fashion and it is going to be my recommendation at the appropriate time that we accept this motion to instruct conferees. Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. BARTON of Texas. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself 3 minutes. Mr. Speaker, I listened with great interest to the comments of the gentleman from West Virginia (Mr. Rahall) about the oil and gas industry, and I know they are heartfelt. I would point out that this bill has a sizable section on clean coal technology that the gentleman is one of the co-authors of. I know the gentleman thinks that is an excellent part of the bill, and it is an excellent part of the bill. Just as there are things that help his part of the country and his industry and his people, some of us think that some of the other parts of the bill that might have some impact on deep water drilling and keeping marginal wells and stripper wells in, we do not see those as efforts to help an industry so much as we see those as efforts to keep the working man working and to keep energy prices at stable levels. Mr. Speaker, I understand that there can be differences of opinion, and I want the gentleman to know that we are going to accept this motion to instruct and go to conference in a bipartisan way. As some of the issues that the gentleman raised come up, Members will listen; and as the gentleman is also a conferee, I am sure the gentleman will listen, and we will report back a bill that the American people will find good for the country.

Mr. BARTON of Texas. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding me time. Mr. Speaker, I want to point out the obvious before I get into a little of the substance. We are technically debating a motion to instruct conferees, and we are going to accept it. Some are trying to pick a fight, and the Republicans are in a good mood today. We do not want to fight. We want to go to conference and work on a bipartisan basis for an energy policy. The Committee on Energy and Commerce, the distinguished gentleman from Louisiana is the distinguished chairman of it, passed this bill 50 to 5, with the good help of the gentleman from Michigan (Mr. Dingell) and the gentleman from Virginia (Mr. Boucher) and others. My subcommittee passed it 29 to 1. We are the ``happy face'' committee. We want to go to conference with the other body and work in a bipartisan basis. So we are very willing to say we do not want an energy policy that increases the national deficit. Let us think about that a little bit. This country for over 150 years has had an energy policy that is based on private markets, where we allocate capital through the free enterprise system to create energy sources at the lowest possible cost possible. Because of that, we have the world's greatest economy. Now, if we were really having a debate today, I would posit the question, if you have an energy policy that is balanced and tries to have a production component and an environmental component and a consumption component that results in lower prices, is that going to increase or decrease the national deficit? Or if you have an energy policy that tries to be anti-energy that results in higher energy prices, is that going to add to or subtract from the deficit? I would say an energy policy that is balanced and that has the net result of a balanced approach, that has lower energy prices, is going to result in either lower deficits or, probably, surpluses. To put this in personal terms, if you go to the gas pump and pay $1.25 a gallon, or if you go and pay $2.25 a gallon, which helps your economy the most? Obviously, if you only pay $1.25. If you get your electricity bill and you pay 7 cents a kilowatt, is that better than getting an electricity bill that you pay 17 cents a kilowatt? Obviously, if you pay less, you have more money to do other things for your family. Well, the energy bill before us actually is a balanced bipartisan approach to try to create an energy policy for the 21st century that results in moderately priced energy, in large quantities, so we can continue to have the kind of free market economy that we have had. Now, let us look at some of the specifics in the bill. Let us see whether we think these are good things or bad things. These are in the bill. These are not debating points, they are in the bill. We require that Federal buildings reduce their energy consumption by 35 percent. We require that we put more money into the Low Income Heating and Cooling Program, the LIHEAP program. That was an amendment adopted in my subcommittee that was offered by the gentlewoman from California (Mrs. Bono). We have increased funding for the DOE weatherization program. We have a requirement that the gentleman from Louisiana (Mr. Tauzin) and the gentleman from Michigan (Mr. Dingell) worked out on a bipartisan basis that our trucks and cars need to reduce the amount of gasoline that they consume by 5 billion gallons over 5 years. We have increased research grants for alternative fuels like hydrogen and things of that sort. We have a very good program for advanced clean coal technology. We have increased funding requests for fusion energy, hydrogen energy, bioenergy, renewable energy and solar energy. We have a program to try to do some research for ultra-deep water, oil and gas drilling in the Gulf of Mexico, which I think is a good thing. I could go on and on. But the bottom line is, this is a balanced bill, it is a bipartisan bill; it is a comprehensive bill. We need to accept this motion to instruct, go to conference, and work with the other body to bring back a conference report that results in lower energy prices for the American people for the next 20, 30, 40, 50 years. And with the leadership of the gentleman from Louisiana (Mr. Tauzin), who is going to chair the conference, I am very confident that we are going to do that.

Mr. BARTON of Texas. Mr. Speaker, we have some lignite coal, and we are proud of it; and some of it was in my old congressional district.

Mr. BARTON of Texas. Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent to take from the Speaker's table the bill (H.R. 4) to enhance energy conservation, research and development and to provide for security and diversity in the energy supply for the American people, and for other purposes, with a Senate amendment thereto, disagree to the Senate amendment, and agree to the conference asked by the Senate.

Mr. BARTON of Texas

Mr. BARTON of Texas. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding me time. Mr. Speaker, it is ironic that my good friend the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Frost) from the 24th District was talking about being afraid of the majority. This bill has passed with majorities every time it has come to the floor. My guess is later this evening when we vote on it, we are going to get over 200 Republicans to vote for it and somewhere between 30 and 40 Democrats. I wish we could get 90 Democrats and actually get the two-thirds vote, but because the Constitution says you have to have a supermajority to pass a tax increase, we have not been able to reach that hurdle. I am okay with requiring a two-thirds vote to pass a constitutional amendment, because you need consensus in the country. As long as two- thirds of the House Democrats oppose this, it is not going to pass, even if we get 80 or 90 percent of the House Republicans. So the Constitution says to do important things you have got to show that you have got a super-consensus. I also think that it is ironic that in the other body, which is controlled by the Democrats right now, it takes a supermajority to bring a bill to the floor. My good friend from the Committee on Rules knows this. If 41 Senators do not want a bill to come to the floor in the other body, it will not come to the floor. It takes a supermajority in the other body to invoke cloture. I think it should take a supermajority to raise taxes on the American people. The Constitution as it was originally adopted had an absolute prohibition against income taxes, an absolute prohibition. In 1913 the Supreme Court said income taxes are constitutional. In 1914 President Woodrow Wilson passed a temporary income tax bill. The tax burden on the average taxpayer has gone up 4,000 percent since 1914; 4,000 percent. Those of us that support this amendment say it is now about time to give the taxpayers a break, to require a supermajority two-thirds vote to raise taxes. Mr. Speaker, the Tax Limitation Amendment has 150 cosponsors and is supported by over three dozen pro-taxpayer, pro-growth, and small business organizations. I am proud to be an original cosponsor of H.J. Res. 96, the Tax Limitation Amendment, which would require a two-thirds supermajority requirement for net tax increases. I have long been a firm proponent of tax limitation since my arrival in Congress in 1985. The American Taxpayers deserve the right to know that Members of congress will not spend their money needlessly or without a strong consensus. One vote is simply not enough. I strongly believe it must be more difficult for Congress to raise taxes. That is the primary purpose behind this amendment. In fact, taxes are higher now than they have ever been and federal revenues are growing at an alarming rate. Individual income taxes are higher now than ever before. By raising the bar on tax increases, we place the focus where it should be--on cutting wasteful spending. There has long been in our political system a bias toward raising taxes. Spending benefits are targeted at specific groups. These special interests successfully lobby Congress and the President for more spending. Taxes, on the other hand, are spread among millions of people. Taxpayers usually cannot come together as effectively as a special interest group with a specific appropriation to defend. As Congress seeks fiscal responsibility and spending remains high, the built-in pressure forces Congress towards more taxes. The supermajority provision balances this pressure. The Tax Limitation Amendment will provide flexibility to Members who want to honestly adjust the tax code without raising taxes. The language of the Amendment subjects net tax increases to the supermajority requirement. Any bill that would increase some taxes, but also reduce others by a larger amount, could still pass with a simple majority. Also, any fundamental tax reform which would have the overall effect of lower taxes could still pass with a simple majority. The Tax Limitation Amendment will keep the current tax code from getting much worse and will lock into place any new system which may replace it. The amendment does not require a two-thirds vote for every tax increase in any bill. Individual provisions of bills which increase internal revenues are not along subject to the two-thirds requirements. Any entire bill which overall would increase the internal revenues beyond the de minimis amount is subject to the two-thirds requirement. As a result, Congress could pass by a simple majority a bill which does have provisions increasing the internal revenue, yet on the whole does not have an increase beyond the de minimis amount. The Tax Limitation Amendment is intended to make major tax increases more difficult. It is not intended to stop all tax legislation. Most legislation making corrections or small changes to the tax code are structured to be slightly revenue positive, at least in some years, because it is very difficult to make a bill be exactly revenue neutral in all the relevant time periods. Since bills which are a net revenue loss are subject to complicated budget process rules, the Tax Limitation Amendment allows these and other small increases to pass with a simple majority. Opponents of the Tax Limitation Amendment argue that we are trying to protect tax loopholes; however, the truth is that the de minimis exemption would allow nearly all loopholes to be closed without the super majority requirement. Most loophole closing would not produce enough revenue to surpass the ``de minimis'' test, and, therefore, could be passed with the current simple majority. Only the combining of several major loopholes would exceed the ``de minimis'' amount and require the two-thirds vote. Experience in the states proves tax limitation works. The millions of Americans living in states who have tax limitation in their state constitutions know they are better off. These people have slower growth in taxes, slower growth in spending, faster growing economics, and more shrinking unemployment rate. Taxpayers would enjoy the same type of benefits and protection on their Federal returns if the Tax Limitation Amendment is adopted on a national scale. With supermajority requirements for tax increases, American taxpayers would see fewer and smaller growth in taxes and spending, and a stronger economy and employment base. In fact, the American taxpayers would be taxed billions of dollars less if tax limitation had been in effect during the last five major tax increases. Four of those five bills passed with less than a two- thirds supermajority. The 1993 tax increase, the largest in history, passed by one vote. In order to achieve a supermajority, that tax increase would have had to be much lower to even have a chance of passing. Any tax increase that passes with a two-thirds vote in each chamber of Congress will have greater support among the American people than an increase that is passed by the slimmest of margins. Such a consensus should be required from both Congress and the American people before we start increasing tax bills again. That is why I am here--to make future tax increases more difficult. April 15 has become known in this country not for the warm weather that usually accompanies it, but for the ``Tax Man'' who on this day reaches into the pockets of the American taxpayer to take too much of their hard earned money. Americans are frustrated with the size of their individual tax bills and the effect that the collective tax burden has on the economy, their businesses, and their lives. The American people want to know that Congress is trying to help them. Making future tax increases more difficult is the perfect response. It is time to stand up for the American Taxpayer. It is time to pass the Tax Limitation Amendment.