Robert Byrd

Mr. BYRD

Mr. BYRD. Mr. President, have other Senators spoken on this amendment?

Mr. BYRD. I thank the Chair. Mr. President, the distinguished Senator from Illinois, Mr. Durbin, has offered this amendment, and I think he has spoken for a good cause. He is a very highly respected member of the Appropriations Committee, the committee that I chair. I salute him for speaking out on this matter. I have listened to the poignant cases that he has referred to of persons who have been infected with AIDS. There is no question but that the cause for which he speaks is one which the world should be greatly concerned about. But there is a limit, in the first place, to our ability as a nation to fund even the good causes. We can only do so much. And regardless of how much we might appropriate today for this purpose, we can never appropriate enough. There will never be enough money in the U.S. Treasury that we can utilize for this purpose. There will never be enough to fully deal with this pandemic. So, Mr. President, I salute the distinguished Senator from Illinois for his determination, for his humanitarianism, and for the appeal that he has made in this matter. But I have to oppose the amendment. We have a bill here that has been carefully worked out on a bipartisan basis. The ranking member and I, and all the members on his side of the aisle and the members on my side of the aisle--including the distinguished Senator from Illinois--have worked laboriously to produce a bill that will bring the necessary appropriations for the protection of the homeland. The President made a request, and based on the very thorough hearings that were conducted by my full Committee on Appropriations, we have enlarged over and above the President's request. But we think we are acting judiciously and based on the hearings of the people at the local level: the firemen, the policemen, the health service, the medical personnel. And we have listened to the Governors and the mayors and seven of the Cabinet officers of this executive branch, and the Director of FEMA. It has been a long and tenuous ordeal as far as I am concerned. I have been working on this bill for months. I think it is important we get it to conference, and that we get it on the President's desk. Now, the President sent word to this committee last year that he did not need the additional moneys this committee was proposing for homeland defense. And Mr. Tom Ridge wrote me a letter saying they did not need the money, did not need more money. But we appropriated $4 billion more for homeland security last year, and the President signed that bill. And that money has been well spent. It is producing results. And it is making a difference. We think we have acted judiciously and very carefully in this instance. So we are adding moneys this year over and above the President's request. But we have a responsibility, as elected Members of this body, elected by the American people, elected by the people of our States, to use our judgment; that is what we are doing. No President sends any Senator here--no President, whether he be Democrat or Republican. I would say this if we had a Democratic President. We have only our own judgment. And we do the best we can to represent the people. How much time do I have?

Mr. BYRD. I thank the Chair. I have to oppose the amendment. And so I will make a point of order. I hope Senators will support the point of order and will oppose any motion to waive. Section 205 of H. Con. Res. 290, the fiscal year 2001 concurrent resolution on the budget, created a point of order against an emergency designation on nondefense spending. Now, I was against the kind of vote that is required to support that. But that is what we have. And I am going to use it. I am going to use that point of order. It is the same point of order I used against an equally good cause when Senator Kennedy had his amendment before the Senate with respect to summer schools. The amendment contains nondefense spending with an emergency designation. Pursuant to section 205 of H. Con. Res. 290, the fiscal year 2001 concurrent resolution on the budget, I make a point of order against the emergency designation contained in the amendment.

Mr. BYRD. Reserving the right to object, if the emergency designation falls on this point of order, there still has to be another point of order which should be immediate. And I hope the distinguished whip will take that into consideration in his request.

Mr. BYRD. Mr. President, it remains necessary to make a point of order against the amendment under section 302(f) of the Congressional Budget Act. Section 302(f) is the point of order against spending in excess of the relevant 302(b) allocation, and there is no general purpose discretionary headroom in the allocation of any subcommittee. Therefore, I make the point of order under section 302(f) of the Budget Act, as amended, that the amendment provides spending in excess of the relevant subcommittees' 302(b) allocation.

Mr. BYRD. Where does that leave us, Mr. President?

Mr. BYRD. Has the Senator yielded me the time?

Mr. BYRD. Mr. President, who has the time?

Mr. BYRD. How much time is remaining?

Mr. BYRD. Does any other Senator have time? I have 2\1/2\ minutes. Does any other Senator have time?

Mr. BYRD. Mr. President, I do not need 4\1/2\ minutes. The distinguished Senator from Illinois has made a very generous suggestion in asking all of his colleagues to support the amendment. He has made an excellent case for his amendment. He was not successful in this instance, but he has been very generous, very gracious, and I want to, in particular, thank him for the fine example he sets in this regard. I am willing to accept the amendment on this side of the aisle, and I hope my counterpart will do the same on the other side. I think Senator Stevens will do that.

Mr. BYRD. The Senator wants a rollcall?

Mr. BYRD. Mr. President, what is the request?

Mr. BYRD. Mr. President, is the Senator going to make a point of order?

Mr. BYRD. On this amendment?

Mr. BYRD. I object.

Mr. BYRD. Mr. President, have the yeas and nays been ordered?

Mr. BYRD. I understand the Senator from Tennessee wants the yeas and nays.

Mr. BYRD. I yield back the time.

Mr. BYRD. I voted for it then, and I am for it now.

Mr. BYRD. Mr. President, the distinguished Senator from Texas and other Senators--I believe the distinguished Senator from Oklahoma made the same statement--say that this is a precedent. Am I correct?

Mr. BYRD. Let me state to the Senate the real precedent. It was enacted by this Congress when it was under the control of the Republican Party--both Houses--in 2001. It was in title I of the bill making appropriations for Kosovo and other national security matters. Here is what the provision said at that time: Section 126. Any amount appropriated in this chapter that is designated by the Congress as an emergency requirement pursuant to section 251(B)(2)(a) of the Balanced Budget and Emergency Deficit Control Act of 1985, as amended, shall not be available for obligation unless all-- Not just part-- unless all such amounts are designated by the President upon enactment of this Act as emergency requirements pursuant to such section. That was the precedent, and I voted for it, and the Senator from Texas voted for it.

Mr. BYRD. How much time did we have for making some comments?

Mr. BYRD. Is the Senator going to make any remarks in support of his point?

Mr. BYRD. Madam President, I move to waive the Gramm point of order.