Robert Byrd

Mr. BYRD

Mr. BYRD. Mr. President, what is the pending business before the Senate?

Mr. BYRD. At the conclusion of the period for morning business, what would be the business before the Senate?

Mr. BYRD. The ISTEA bill?

Mr. BYRD

Mr. BYRD. I thank the Chair. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that I may speak out of order for as long as I may require.

Mr. BYRD. Mr. President, what is the question before the Senate and what is the business before the Senate?

Mr. BYRD. Mr. President, I thank the Chair.

Mr. BYRD

Mr. BYRD. Mr. President, before the distinguished majority leader yields the floor, will he allow me to inquire, is he in a position to say when the Senate will take up the resolution reported from the Senate Appropriations Committee on yesterday disapproving the acts of the President in vetoing certain projects in the fiscal year 1998 Military Construction Appropriations Act?

Mr. BYRD

Mr. BYRD. I have the floor.

Mr. BYRD. We will recall that the President had disapproved various projects that had been included in the Fiscal Year 1998 Military Construction Appropriations Act. The President, under his newly gained authority, had disapproved 38 of the projects, In the letter, Mr. Raines states: ``The President used his authority responsibly to cancel projects that were not requested in the budget.'' He doesn't have any authority that I know of to cancel projects solely on the basis that they were not requested in his budget. He can do it, of course. He has the veto pen. But he is not acting on any ``authority'' that I know about. It is not in the Constitution. He doesn't get any authority there. He doesn't get his authority from the Line-Item Veto Act to ``cancel projects that were not requested in the budget.'' That Line Item Veto Act sets forth certain criteria for the guidance of the President in exercising the line-item veto pen. But nowhere in those criteria will there be found a criterion which says that the President may ``cancel projects that were not requested in the budget.'' Yet, Mr. Raines refers to such authority in his letter. ``The President used his authority responsibly to cancel projects that were not requested in the budget.'' Well, I say, as I have said many times, that the administration-- whatever administration is in power--will see that Line Item Veto Act as it wishes to see it. It will read into it whatever it wants to read into it. It will hear whatever it wants to hear from anonymous bureaucrats working in the subterranean tunnels of the White House who will advise the President as to what should be stricken by the veto pen. We can trust them to expand upon the power that has been given them in the act. And they will read into it and interpret the words, and constantly be expanding their power. I predicted that that would be the case. Mr. President, I hope with this legislation to be able to remove that sword of Damocles that we ourselves helped to suspend over our unlucky and graying heads. But we have nobody to blame except ourselves. I am not going to blame the President if he uses that authority that we have given to him. We gave it to him without a whimper; no resistance. Resistance? No. We eagerly gave it to him. ``Take it, Mr. President. Take it. Take this authority. Take this legislation. Use your veto pen.'' President Reagan said we had the line item veto in every State government. ``They have it at the State level. Give it to me. If the States can have it, why can't I have it?'' I have heard that argument ad nauseam--that if the States have the line item veto power, therefore, why not have it at the Federal level? Why not let the President have the line-item veto? The Governors have it. They balance their budgets. Of course, I argued time and time again that they don't really balance their budgets. They go into debt just as the Federal Government goes into debt. But we were told, ``The States have the line item veto. The President should have it.'' Mr. President, that kind of an argument signifies and reveals a lack of knowledge on the part of those who use the argument. This is the Constitution of the United States. It is not the constitution of the State of West Virginia or the State of New York or the State of Alabama or the State of Tennessee. It is the Constitution of the United States of America. And this Constitution, while it contains some inhibitions upon certain actions by the States, does not attempt to tell the State governments how they shall legislate. It assures the States of having republican forms of government. But it does not say to any State, ``Thou shalt not have the line item veto.'' The Constitution, with reference to legislative powers, speaks of the Congress. ``All legislative Powers herein granted shall be vested in a Congress of the United States which shall consist of a Senate and House of Representatives.'' There are 50 States. There are 50 State constitutions, and whatever any State wishes to write into its constitution as to a line-item veto power, there is no prohibition in this Federal Constitution against the State's doing it. The theory and the system of separation of powers and checks and balances are more finely drawn at the Federal level than at the State level. Under our Federal system, we have the separation of powers. We have mixed powers. We have checks and balances. That is at the Federal level. I heard a Senator say the other day, ``Well, I am disappointed that when the President exercised this veto, he didn't do as we are accustomed to seeing done at the State level with the line-item veto.'' But, Mr. President, that Senator was talking about two entirely different things--apples and oranges, black and white. This is a Federal Constitution that was meant to guide the Congress and the Federal departments and officers of government, and the framers very wisely provided a scheme whereby there would be checks and there would be balances. There would be the separation of powers, and there would be the interweaving and overlapping of powers between and among the departments. That is at the Federal level. The State constitutions are different. The State of West Virginia may have the line-item veto. The State of West Virginia has a constitution, and in its legislative branch it is governed by that State constitution until and unless the State takes actions that violate the Federal Constitution. But as to how the State will legislate and as to how the Governor of the State will exercise his veto pen, that is entirely up to the State under its constitution. There can be 50 State line-item vetoes. But those are State constitutions. Those are State governments. We are talking about the Federal Constitution. Why Senators haven't been able to distinguish between the State and Federal governments. I can't understand. I thought they would have learned that in their civics classes long, long ago. But they should have learned it back in the elementary schools. There are 50 State governments. There is one Federal Government. Each is supreme in its own sphere of actions. But if there is any conflict, the Federal Government--the Federal Constitution--will then prevail. It is that simple. One doesn't have to be a Phi Beta Kappa to know that. Yet, Senators, many of them, and many Members of the other body, in explaining their support for this ill- advised, unwise piece of legislation, took the stand and said, ``My own State has it. It works well there. I think that the Federal Government should have it''--thus displaying an amazing lack of knowledge of the Constitution, an amazing lack of knowledge of constitutional history, an amazing lack of knowledge of American history and the history of England. The Framers of the Constitution were very well aware of the colonial experience and what had happened in England. They knew that a king had had his head severed from his body on January the 30th of 1649. Imagine that. Parliament created the High Court of Justice which concluded that Charles I was a tyrant, a traitor, and an enemy of the good people of England, and that he should have his head severed from his body. That court was created on January 6, 1649, and 24 days later King Charles was dead. He was executed in front of his palace at White Hall before thousands of people. He and his father, James I, had believed that kings ruled by divine might and that they were above Parliament and above the people. So it is out of that history that the liberties and freedoms of the American people were born. And they are written down and guaranteed in this Constitution. But I have said these things many times, and, no doubt, if the Lord let's me live and keep my voice, I shall have the opportunity to say them again on several occasions. I feel so strongly about this. The Congress of the United States has never, never committed such an act as it committed in enacting the line-item veto. That action flew in the face of the plain English words that are in this Constitution. And Congress did it nonchalantly; cavalierly. Was it being guided by the Constitution? No. Was it being guided by the polls? Apparently. Because it was a popular thing. The American people believed by a tremendous majority that the line-item veto was to be desired. It won't reduce the national debt. I say to Senators, take a good look at the budget after this year and after next year, if, God forbid, this ill-advised piece of legislation still governs the legislative process. The savings that accrue from the line-item veto will indeed be meager I read in the newspapers where the President said he was saving X amount of dollars by these vetoes. Well, he cut out a little item in West Virginia. ``Ah, that's why Senator Byrd is against the line-item veto. There it is. He likes his pork. That's why he is opposed to this.'' Well, I am not going to ask the President for it back, and if I did, he could not put the vetoed item back. He has cut off its head. He cannot breathe new life into that stiff and cold corpse. After having committed the act of execution, after having wielded the ax, he cannot put it back. I have seen something here and there in the newspapers to the effect that the administration would be willing to negotiate with Senators to restore such vetoed projects. Well, Mr. President, use your pen. Veto the item in West Virginia. There will be other bills coming to you. There will be other items for West Virginia. The President's advisers may say, perhaps you can get Senator Byrd to negotiate with you if you tell him you won't veto that piece of pork. Perhaps he will vote for your nominee for such and such a position or he will vote for such and such a treaty or he will vote with you on the fast-track bill. Just tell him that you don't want to line-item veto those West Virginia items, that West Virginia pork. Senator Byrd may then come to his senses. Well, I say go to it. ``Lay on, Macduff; and damned be him that first cries `hold, enough.''' I am not negotiating with any administration over any item for West Virginia. So much for that. So much for the suggestion that Senator Byrd's pork for West Virginia is why he is against this line-item veto. Well, perish the thought. That has never guided my thinking. I feel more strongly about what the Congress has done in enacting this piece of trash, the line-item veto, than I do about all of the pork that those hollows could possibly hold among the high and majestic mountains of what I consider to be the greatest State in the Union, whose motto is ``Moutaineers are always free.'' Mr. President, could the Senate of the United States give away its advice and consent power? No. Could the Senate of the United States give away its power to try impeachments? No. There are other powers in the Constitution that this Senate and the Congress, as the case may be, cannot give away. And I maintain that the same is true with the legislative power that is set forth in the first sentence of the Constitution. There are those who would be willing to sit down with the White House, with the representatives of the President, on items that he may threaten to veto. There are Senators, there are Members of the House, who may be willing to sit down and negotiate with the White House, to come to terms, as it were, to yield to the administration on this matter or that matter, or some aspect of the appropriation which he has threatened to veto. There will be those who may very well be lured by the siren call of negotiation in order to save the project of a particular Member of the Senate or House of Representatives. I say to my colleagues, don't negotiate, because when an item has reached the stage of conference, I think that we have reached a stage when it is too late to negotiate. Some subcommittees spend weeks and months in studying appropriations bills that come under their jurisdiction. The people who sit on a particular subcommittee that has jurisdiction over a particular appropriation bill are, for the most part, experts in the subject matter of that appropriations bill. Some have had experience for years and years, perhaps even decades, in dealing with that particular appropriation. They know the subject matter well. They have worked over it. They have had their staffs work on it. They have received the budgets that have been submitted by the President. They already know what the wishes of the administration are. And from time to time they receive further guidance as to the wishes of the administration with respect to a particular project or program, or with respect to all of the items in the President's budget that are within the jurisdiction of that subcommittee. They have had all that guidance all along and it has been good. And we welcome that guidance. But once the subcommittees go through all of these months of labor, and with their staffs working hard on legislation, it is too late when, at the last minute, the White House sends its representatives up to Capitol Hill and says, ``This is veto bait. That item is veto bait. That project is veto bait. The White House will not accept it. The White House wants thus and so. That wasn't in the President's budget.'' Where in the Constitution are we told that the Congress may only consider items that are in the President's budget? Is that inscribed in any law, that Congress may only consider items that are in the President's budget; that Members of Congress can't add items of their own, based on the needs of their own constituents, needs which they, the elected representatives, know best? Where is it written that Congress has to be confined only to the items that are in the President's budget? Where is that set down in stone? I have never seen it in stone or in bronze, or inscribed upon any piece of granite. It just isn't there. I am not willing at that point, then, to sit down and be jerked around by any administration, Republican or Democrat. They are all the same, as far as I am concerned, when it comes to this matter that we are discussing. I was chairman of the Appropriations Committee for 6 years. I said, ``There will be no politics in here, no partisanship.'' When Senator Hatfield was chairman of the committee there was no partisanship. When Senator Stennis was chairman of the committee we didn't have politics in the committee. As far as I am concerned, there are no Democrats and no Republicans on the Appropriations Committee. We are all Members of the Senate and there is no partisanship. If they want to argue over politics they can do it on the floor, but we don't do it in that committee. And I feel that Members have just as much right under the Constitution and laws of this land, its customs, traditions and regulations--just as much right as any administration has to request appropriations for projects and programs that are deemed to be in the interests of the constituencies of the elected representatives. So I will not hear--I have ears, but will not hear those who exhort, ``That little item you have in West Virginia is veto bait.'' I say, ``Go ahead, go ahead, veto it. Lay on, Macduff.'' That's the way I feel about the projects of other Members. I want to help the President where I can help him. I want to help the administration where I can help it. There have been times when I have helped Republican administrations and Republican Presidents. But this is one Senator who will not be persuaded or swayed by threats that, ``That item is veto bait. You'll have to modify it, you'll have to do it our way or the President will veto it.'' So, Senators, don't negotiate. In so doing we legitimize what I consider to be an illegitimate end run around the Constitution of the United States. We legitimize it. That's where the administration wants us. That's where they would like to have us--under their thumb. ``Oh, we've got them now, they are negotiating.'' Finally, just a word more about the letter that I received yesterday from Director Raines, the Executive Office of the President. It says in the last paragraph, ``While we strongly oppose S. 1292''--we? Who is ``we''? I wish the President would have signed the letter himself. But I understand he can't sign all the mail that goes out of his office. I know who is purportedly the author of the letter. But, nevertheless it says: While we strongly oppose S. 1292, we are committed to working with Congress to restore funding for those projects that were canceled as a result of inaccuracies in the data provided to the Department of Defense. Now, in saying that, the President, through his surrogate, admits that some of the projects were canceled based on errors, based on inaccuracies, based on data that were inaccurate and provided by the Department of Defense. The administration was mistaken in exercising the veto pen, and they admit it there. I would like for any Senator within the range of my voice, or anybody else, to tell me how Mr. Raines, or the President, or anybody in the administration, expects to, ``restore funding for those projects that were canceled as a result of inaccuracies in the data provided by the Department of Defense.'' Mr. Raines says that we--I assume that he means by ``we,'' the personal pronoun ``we,'' I assume he means the President and the administration, ``we''--``While we strongly oppose [this disapproval resolution] * * * we are committed to working with Congress to restore funding for those projects that were canceled. * * *'' Now, how is the funding going to be restored? Those projects are dead. The head has been severed, the corpse has been laid out on a piece of cold marble and every drop of blood has been drained from the veins of those projects. How, then, do they propose to restore funding? How is it going to be done? The item has been canceled. The President has unilaterally exercised a legislative act and unilaterally repealed that legislation. It is dead. That project is dead. The line-item veto does not give the President the authority to restore it. It may have been an item that he canceled 5 minutes after he had signed the bill into law. He may have slept on it a while and then overnight thought, ``Well, I think it might be a good idea to cancel a few more of those items,'' and he cancels a few more. And the third day after the bill has become law, some of his aides come to him and say, ``Mr. President, we think we have found some more. We didn't find it written in the four corners of the appropriations bill, we found it in a table. We found it in a committee report.'' These aides will say to the President, ``You know what? We have been working 36 hours and we find projects on these tables that are not in the bill. Don't look in there, Mr. President. But there are tables that were used in some hearings, or used during markup. And in those tables we have found some more items that we think you ought to consider vetoing,'' and the President goes back and he vetoes them. Then along comes the 5th day, the 23rd hour and the 59th minute, and the President thinks, ``Ah, that Bob Byrd, he said one day, he wouldn't negotiate. Can you find another item for me? I want to strike one of his projects. I'll make him rue the day he said those words.'' In any event, those items are gone. The President cannot go back and restore them, no matter how sorry he may be. He finds from the Department of Defense data that he was mistaken; the data were wrong. It is too late. So how does Mr. Raines intend to work with Congress to restore funding for those projects that were cancelled? Tell me how? How do they intend to restore funding? They can't be restored by inoculation, by the use of a needle. How do they intend to restore funding? As I was saying earlier, they claimed that they saved x millions of dollars through these cancellations, but Senators should watch. That project that they struck out of that bill for West Virginia this year, I intend to try to put it back next year, because it can be justified. It is important to the defense of this country. It is in the 5-year plan of the Department of Defense. I intend to put it back in. That may be a year away. So, have they saved money? How much does one subtract from the figures that they say they save through their actions, through the President's actions in line-item vetoing these projects? As we look back a year from now, how much will they have saved when some or most of the items will have been put back into the bills we pass next year Many of the projects will be put back, so the President's veto of projects really won't constitute savings after all. What it will result in is perhaps increased costs because of inflation or other reasons; the items will cost more when they are put back. Therefore, while it warms the cockles of my heart to see in the letter from Mr. Raines that ``the administration is committed to working with Congress to restore the funding for those projects that were canceled,'' I shall go home wondering what is meant by that, how they will work with Congress to restore the funding. How will they do it? Mr. President, I hope that by introducing legislation today to restore the legislative branch to the standing and the stature that it has had for over 200 years, I hope to contribute to the welfare of my country, the well-being of our people, the perpetuation of the dream of America and the dream of a system that has its roots, not just in Philadelphia in the year 1787, but also in the colonial experience, and the history of England, roots that extend back, yes, as Montesquieu thought, even to the ancient Romans. I hope that we will restore the system which was given to us by our forebears and which they expected us to hand on to our sons and daughters. Who saves his country saves all things, saves himself and all things saved do bless him. Who let's his country die let's all things die, dies himself ignobly, and all things dying curse him. Mr. President, let us act and let us work to save our country! I ask unanimous consent that an article in the Washington Post titled ``Line-Item Veto Tips Traditional Balance of Power'' be printed in the Record.

Mr. BYRD. Mr. President, the Senate passed the so-called Line-Item Veto Act on March 23, 1995. The legislation went to conference where it lay dormant for something like a year, and I am told that the standard bearer of the Republican Party in last year's Presidential election prevailed upon the leadership in both Houses to get this matter out of conference and get it passed into law so that, I assume, he, Mr. Dole, would then feel that he would become the first wielder of the pen under this act. So the leadership went to work and on March 27--these dates are so etched in my gray matter between my two ears that I will never forget the dates. If anything ever happens to my mind and I lose my memory, I daresay this will be one of the last things that will be lost. So, on March 27, 1996, the Senate stabbed itself in the back by adopting that conference report. I have answered the Senator's question.

Mr. BYRD. I yield the floor.

Mr. BYRD. Mr. President, I have been intrigued--modestly, if I may say, so as not to exaggerate--at the plethora of complaints that are being in some instances stridently expressed about the President's use of the line-item veto. I suppose what amazes me so much about this matter is that all of this vast panorama of problems that could be expected to occur in the train of passage of the Line-Item Veto Act have been addressed time and time and time again on this Senate floor by me; by my colleague, Senator Moynihan; by my colleague, Senator Levin; by my colleague, Senator Reid; and many other colleagues on both sides of the aisle, including, of course, former Senator Mark Hatfield. We spoke to the galleries here and across the land repeatedly about what could be expected from the use of a President's line-item veto pen should such legislation be passed. We also spoke of the constitutional ramifications of a line-item veto. At the time, I felt that in all probability our expressions of concern were falling upon deaf ears. So of late it has been brought home to me very clearly that although one may speak with stentorian voice, as with the combined voices of 50 men or as if his lungs were of brass, there will nonetheless be ears that will not hear, there will be eyes that will not see, and there will apparently be minds that will not think. So one is left with very little consolation other than to know that what he or she said as a warning in days past was on point, and that history will prove that the point was well taken. Mr. President, I see my dear friend, Senator Moynihan, who is a great teacher. I wish I would have had the opportunity to sit in his classes--a man who is noted in the Congressional Directory as having received 60 honorary degrees. That will make one sit up and take notice--60 honorary degrees! I have never counted my honorary degrees. But I suppose that if I have been the recipient of ten or a dozen, that would certainly be the limit. But Senator Moynihan has foreseen the ramifications of this unwise legislative action by the Congress--and it is now coming home to roost--the so-called ``Line-Item Veto Act.'' He has joined with me previously many times in discussing the act here and elsewhere. He has joined with me, as did Senator Levin and former Senator Hatfield and two of our colleagues in the other body, in a court challenge against the Line-Item Veto Act. And he joins with me today in cosponsoring this bill to repeal the line-item veto. So I am going to yield to him. I have legislation that I have prepared to repeal this act. Senator Moynihan has joined with me in the preparation of the legislation. And I am going to yield to him because, as I understand it, he needs to get to another appointment right away. So I gladly yield to my friend for as long as he wishes. I ask that I be permitted to yield to Senator Moynihan without losing my right to the floor.

Mr. BYRD. Mr. President, I thank again my friend, the Senator from New York. I have been trying to get in touch with Senator Levin, but I have been unable to do that today, so I will not add his name at this point until I can be reassured by him that he wishes to be a cosponsor. I have no doubt that he will be. But I shall in due time add his name, and others', if they so wish. Mr. President, the legislation which I am introducing is very simple. It reads as follows: The Line Item Veto Act, (Public Law 104-130), and [any] amendments made by that Act [would be] repealed. The Impoundment Control Act of 1974 shall be applied and administered as if the Line-Item Veto Act had not been enacted. Mr. President, I hope that we will proceed to have hearings on this legislation that I am introducing on behalf of Mr. Moynihan and myself, and that we can generate some interest on the part of Members to testify on the bill. Even though there will undoubtedly be more and more cases in the courts resulting from the line-item vetoes that have already occurred, and those that will occur in the future, I think that the legislative branch should proceed to correct the grievous error that it made in passing the act. In the meantime, I hope that the courts will also proceed. I hope they will not withhold their judicial power and fail to exercise their judicial responsibility simply because Congress, at some point in time, can itself repeal the Line-Item Veto Act. The point is that, if I am correct in the way I feel about this legislation, our Government is operating under an unconstitutional act with respect to the appropriations process. The President is acting under the presumed authority that he has been given by this nefarious legislation. But the act itself, I maintain, is unconstitutional. And so, feeling as strongly as I do about the act, I believe that I have a responsibility to offer legislation to repeal it. And that is what I am doing. In one way or the other, hopefully, the act will be stricken by the Court or repealed by the Congress. And I hope that neither body will wait on the other, that neither department will wait on the other to perform the action that would be necessary. In offering this legislation, I am attempting to restore the kind of Government, with its separation of powers and checks and balances, that the American people have enjoyed for over 200 years. Never before has Congress enacted legislation that would disturb that separation of powers, those checks and balances. There has been some talk about it over the years. President Grant first advocated the line-item veto. And the first resolution or the first bill that was ever introduced in the Congress to provide for a line-item veto was introduced, interestingly enough--or perhaps ironically enough--by a West Virginian--Charles J. Faulkner--a West Virginia Congressman, well over 100 years ago. And since President Grant's first advocacy, most Presidents, or perhaps all with the exception of President Taft, have advocated the line-item veto. President Washington, the first President of the United States, indicated unequivocally--unequivocally--that any President, under the Constitution, had to accept legislation in toto. The President had to sign it in toto or veto it in its entirety. He could not pick and choose provisions in a bill. There have been hundreds of pieces of legislation introduced over the years since the administrations of President Grant that would provide either for a constitutional amendment or provide legislation, such as was the case in this instance, to give the President the line-item veto authority. I have listened to the arguments over the years. And what I said would happen has come true. There is considerable turbulence now. I said that the outcome of this legislation, if it ever became law, would be that the relations between the executive branch and the legislative branch would be hurt, that it would prove to be bad for the country, that tensions which normally exist and were expected to exist between the branches of Government--expected by the framers to exist--those tensions would be intensified, and they have been. There has been considerable turbulence on Capitol Hill as a result of the President's having exercised his line-item veto--this new tool, this new and polished, sharp-edged Damocles' sword that now hangs by a slender hair over the head of every legislator on Capitol Hill. We have given the President a political tool. We have given him a weapon by which he can expect to cower any or all of us and by the threat of the use of that sword which hangs over our collective heads, he will expect to get what he wants, not only on a particular appropriations bill but also in connection with a particular nomination or treaty. I have said these things time and time and time again. I have said that Senators would rue the day, rue the day that they enacted legislation giving to this President or any President line-item veto authority. The chickens are coming home to roost. Members are already ruing the day on which they voted to give the President this line-item veto. I have said time and time again that the President would use it, that Members would be intimidated by it, and that, to a degree, it would have an impact on our freedom of speech in this body. I am sure that there are Members who will now hesitate in some instances to speak out against the administration because they must always carry in the back of their minds a remembrance that the President may exact retribution for words spoken in this Chamber or outside the Chamber by Members in criticism of the administration. They will hesitate because they will understand that the President now can wreak some vengeance. He can threaten to cancel this project or to cancel that program that affects a particular constituency or region. It does not have to be one State or one congressional district, it can be an entire region and the veto can be used politically. I am amazed at the expressions of surprise that the line-item veto is ``being used as a political weapon.'' We need not be surprised that a President will use the item veto as a political weapon. Who is to blame? Not the President. We are to blame. We are supposed to be grown- up men and women. I am amazed, absolutely amazed, that grown-up men and women--who are expected to know something about the Constitution, are expected to have read it at some point in their lives, and who should be expected to retire to it from time to time and read it again or read portions of it--I am amazed that Members who have stood at the desk in front of this Chamber and with upheld right hand, and the left hand on the Bible, literally or figuratively speaking, have sworn an oath to support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic, would hand the President such a weapon to be used against themselves. Then they have turned right around and taken that oath lightly by emasculating the Constitution passing the Line Item Veto Act. Obviously, lightly. Montesquieu said, when it came to the oath, the ancient Romans were the most religious people in the world. They honored their oath. The first consul, Lucius Junius Brutus, took office in the year 509 B.C., that being the date when the Roman republic was first established. Lucius Brutus was purported to be a distant ancestor of Marcus Brutus, who was involved in the conspiracy to assassinate Caesar. Lucius Junius Brutus required the people of Rome to swear on oath that never again would they be ruled by a king. Tarquin the Proud had just been vanquished and run out of Rome, and so Lucius Junius Brutus, the first consul--there were two consuls but he was one of the two, and he was most responsible for the driving out of Tarquin the Proud--felt so strongly about the matter that he required an oath on the part of the Roman people that they would never again be ruled by a king. But it wasn't long until there came to his attention information that his own two sons, Titus and Tiberius, were conspiring to bring back a king, an Etruscan king to rule over Rome. Upon receiving this information, Brutus called the people to come together in an assembly, and in the midst of the people he had his two sons, Tiberius and Titus, executed--his own sons--because they had violated their oaths and conspired to reinstitute the monarchy. The Romans were religiously attached to the oath. They took it seriously. When Marcus Atilius Regulus was sent by the Carthaginians as a prisoner back to the Roman Senate in the year 249 B.C., he went as a prisoner of the Carthaginians. He was a Roman consul and had been taken prisoner by the Carthaginians. In their efforts to secure peace and to have the Romans relinquish Carthaginian prisoners, the Carthaginians sent an envoy to Rome to attempt to work out some arrangements whereby the Carthaginian prisoners would be released and a peace pact could be agreed upon. The Carthaginian Government thought that if they sent this imprisoned Roman consul it would give the delegation more stature and that the Romans would be more likely to come to an agreement. When Marcus Atilius Regulus reached the Roman Senate he was called upon for his opinion concerning the matter and he told the Roman Senate that in his judgment Rome would not benefit by such a treaty. And he said ``I am a chattel of the Carthaginian Government. I am their prisoner and I know that they will hear about what I have stated to the Roman Senate. I know they won't be pleased. Nevertheless, I think it would not benefit my government. I'm with you in spirit. I am a Roman at heart. Even though I am a Carthaginian chattel, I am with you in spirit.'' The Roman Senate offered to protect him and proposed that he not return to Carthage, but he said, ``I took an oath that I would return. I swore to the Carthaginian Government that I would return.'' He said, ``When I make an oath, even to an enemy, I will keep that oath.'' He was conscious upon leaving Rome of the tears of his wife and children who clung to him and who begged him not to return to Carthage. Nevertheless, he felt so strongly about keeping his oath that he went back. As he had predicted, the Carthaginians tortured him. They cut away his eyelids and prepared an enclosure in which there were spikes upon which he was forced to lie, at all times, day and night. With his eyelids cut away, the heat and light from the Sun bore fiercely upon him. He lay upon his back on those spikes, and soon perished. This was an example of a Roman who believed in giving his life rather than break his oath. I am reminded again of what Montesquieu said: When it came to keeping the oath, the Romans were the most religious people in the world. What about us? How faithful are we in keeping our oath to support and defend the Constitution of the United States? Time and time again I have pondered on this, I have reflected on this, and I have wondered as to how often have Members of the Senate gone back and reread the Constitution, the charter of our liberties? Mr. President, we should keep that oath. It is not something to be taken lightly. I think if we take it seriously, we will struggle with our conscience and on matters such as the line-item veto and say to ourselves: How does that fit into this Constitution? Where do I find in this Constitution that the President of the United States has any legislative power? Where is it? Let me read for the Record section 1 of article 1, the very first sentence in the Constitution of the United States, in the operative section. Article 1, section 1: ``All legislative powers herein granted * * *'' All legislative powers--not just some, not a few, not most legislative power, but ``All legislative powers herein granted.'' Well, if legislative powers are not ``herein granted,'' they don't exist. ``All legislative powers herein granted shall be vested * * *'' Not may be, but ``shall be vested in a Congress of the United States.'' Not in the House of Delegates of West Virginia, but in ``a Congress of the United States which shall consist of a Senate and House of Representatives.'' There it is. It is not because I said so, but there it is in the Constitution. And yet with English words plainly written and with those words meaning precisely what they say, we nevertheless have ears and cannot hear, eyes that cannot see, and apparently minds that cannot think when we cavalierly give to the President of the United States a line-item veto with its legislative powers. Now, can we do that? Can we give to the President legislative power? Can we give to the President legislative powers that the Constitution says shall be vested only in one place--the Congress of the United States? Can we, as Members, give away something that is a legislative power? Is it a legislative power? In the Line Item Veto Act, the President is authorized to sign a bill into law, and then, after signing that bill into law, he can ``cancel,'' or repeal, parts of that law. The Constitution says that the President shall faithfully execute the law. But he has just signed this bill into law and he is allowed, under this nefarious piece of legislation, to go back and pick up the same pen with which he signed an appropriation bill into law and he can strike an item, he can strike two items, or he can strike many items. He can strike away 5 percent of the bill, 10 percent of the bill, 90 percent of the bill. Of course, it is a law by then. He can strike it. He can amend it. He can repeal it. It is a legislative power to strike an item from an act. When a Senator moves to strike an item from a bill, that is a legislative act. He moves to amend or he moves to strike, and that is a legislative act. That is an action in the legislative process. He is exercising a legislative power. That Senator will have to have a majority of the Members of the Senate join in support of his motion to strike, else his motion will be lost. ``Those in favor of the motion will say aye, those opposed to the motion will say no. In the opinion of the Chair, the ayes have it, the ayes do have it, and the motion is agreed to.'' If somebody asks for a rollcall or a division, the Chair will proceed accordingly. But a single Member cannot single-handedly strike any item from any bill. He has to go according to the legislative process, which requires a majority of the votes--except in some few instances, which are set forth, in which supermajorities are required. But we are talking here about the normal legislative process. That Member has not yet succeeded. He can get a headline in the paper, but he has not yet succeeded in striking, or amending, or canceling, or repealing that item. He has to also have a majority of the other body, and if the other body is in full attendance, as sometimes it is--there are 435 Members there and he has to have 218 Members supporting him in that other body, and 51 in this body, with all 100 Senators present. He has to have a total of 269 votes in both Houses. That is the legislative process. That is majority rule. And yet to think that grown-up, intelligent, educated, responsible men and women, who are the elected representatives of the people, would come here and cavalierly vote in such a way as to give this President, or any President, Republican, Democrat, Independent, or whatever, the power to unilaterally, with the stroke of a pen, strike out an item in a law; unilaterally, with the stroke of a pen, to amend a law; unilaterally, with the stroke of a pen, to repeal what is in that law that was passed by a majority of the Members of both Houses of Congress--to give all that power to one man, or woman, as the case may be, the President of the United States is beyond all credulity. It is the acme of ridiculosity to even imagine that an intelligent group of men and women in a civilized body, working under a written Constitution, would even think of doing it. I cannot comprehend what motive may have guided a majority of men and women in these two bodies to prostrate themselves before any President and willingly and voluntarily cede away the power over the purse that has been vested by the Constitution in these two bodies, to the President of the United States. Men and women have died in past centuries to have that power vested in the hands of the elected representatives of the people. There was the struggle of Englishmen, which extended over centuries of time, against tyrannical monarchs, to wrest the power of the purse away from the kings and entrust it to the elected representatives of the people. And we cavalierly handed it away to the President. The Roman Senate was not required to yield power to Sulla. The Roman Senate voluntarily handed the power over the purse to Sulla and to Caesar. It made Caesar dictator for 10 years; then it made Caesar dictator for life, with all of the power of the executive and the legislative and the judicial branches in his control. The Roman Senate wasn't required or forced to give Caesar that power; it willingly and voluntarily ceded that power to him. And all of the centuries of time that have come and gone since that fatal act have borne testimony to the unwisdom of the Roman Senate. And history was changed as a result. It had far-reaching consequences when the Roman Senate lost its nerve, lost its vision, lost its way, and willingly and voluntarily ceded over to the dictators, and later to the emperors, the power over the purse. For hundreds of years the Roman Senate had had complete and unchallenged control over the public moneys. We can also read the history of England--and we will find, as I have already indicated, that Englishmen, for centuries, struggled with monarchs who believed that they ruled by divine right, struggled for the prize--the power over the purse. It was at the point of the sword that Englishmen took from the Kings the power over the purse and vested it in Parliament. We can see in our own colonial experience the continuing thread of representative government, with the control of the purse being vested in the hands of the elected representatives of the people in the various State assemblies during the colonial period, and later when the colonies became States. So I am chagrined, I am puzzled, and I am disappointed that Members of Congress would willingly give to any President this power. That is what Congress did. In looking at the letter I received from the Director of the Office of Management and Budget, Mr. Raines, yesterday, I bemusedly pondered again over these words. I will insert this letter into the Record in its entirety. I ask unanimous consent that the letter be printed in the Record at this point.

Mr. BYRD. Mr. President, I send to the desk the bill to which I have referred, and I ask unanimous consent that it be printed in the Record and that it be appropriately referred.

Mr. BYRD. May I respond to that particular question?

Mr. BYRD. Mr. President, I will be happy to yield to the distinguished Senator from Rhode Island for the purpose of his propounding those questions, if I may do so without losing my right to the floor.

Mr. BYRD. Mr. President, I thank the distinguished Senator from New York, Mr. Moynihan, our most learned Member, for his eloquent statement in support of the legislation that I am introducing on behalf of myself and the Senator from New York and the Senator from Michigan. He has never faltered in his opposition to the passage of legislation that would give this President, any President, Democrat or Republican, line-item veto authority. And as he has said so many times, if this is something that is going to be done, it ought to be done as the framers made provision for, and that is by way of a constitutional amendment which will constitute the judgment, hopefully the considered judgment, of the American people from whom all power and authority in this Republic springs. I think Senator Moynihan's reference this morning to the ``New Federalist Papers'' essays is timely. He was kind enough to give me a copy of that volume which I have not yet had the opportunity to read but which I shall very soon. And he has printed in the Record today one of the essays from that volume. I shall look for it in the Congressional Record with great interest. Mr. CHAFEE addressed the Chair.

Mr. BYRD

Mr. BYRD. Yesterday I indicated that I would present for the Record the history of the Federal gasoline excise taxes since the inception of the highway trust fund. I ask unanimous consent that I may have printed for the Record such history.

Mr. BYRD. Now, Mr. President, I had intended to ask unanimous consent that that motion not be amendable. But I thought I should let Mr. Chafee know that I intended to make such a request. He might want to object to it. I had a right to make the motion. He could not keep me from doing that. But I wanted to get consent that it not be amendable, and I thought he had the right to know about that. And I realize he could object to that, and he will. He has told me he will object to that. Now, my purpose in wanting to get such consent is simply this: 60 votes are required for me to waive the points of order under the Budget Act. However, my motion would be amendable, it would be open to amendment, and such an amendment to my motion would require only a majority of votes, so that if all 100 Senators were present and voting, only 51 votes would be required to amend my motion, which, standing alone, would require 60 votes. If the motion to amend my motion to waive were to carry, then a simple majority could add the authors' motion to amend my motion. That would put me at a disadvantage in that it is my understanding that Mr. Domenici might make a motion, the purpose of which would be--and I don't know that he is going to do this --he would repeal the gas tax, the 4.3-cent tax. That may or may not be based on rumor. I haven't heard Senator Domenici say that, but I anticipate that such a motion or some other motion might be made. If that were the case, if that were to be adopted by a majority vote, I would be put at a great disadvantage in trying to get 60 votes for my motion, so I do not intend to make that motion at this time. But it may be that at some future time we can work out something whereby I could get a vote on a motion to waive points of order under the Budget Act against my amendment. That is a motion that is made quite frequently here. Sometimes it carries, sometimes it doesn't. So I intended to make that motion because I feel that the sponsors of our amendment have 60 or more votes in support of such motion and in support of such amendment. Several Senators have indicated to me and have indicated to my three cosponsors that while they will not cosponsor the amendment, they will support it, so that we feel we would have more than 60 votes. But I am not at this time going to make the motion for the reasons I have stated.

Mr. BYRD

Mr. BYRD. Mr. President, what is the business before the Senate?

Mr. BYRD. Mr. President, I wonder if the distinguished majority leader would mind if the Senate returned to the consideration of the highway bill?

Mr. BYRD. That is correct. I would like to make them while the highway bill is pending before the Senate.

Mr. BYRD. I thank the Chair.

Mr. BYRD

Mr. BYRD. On another matter, I'm informed that on yesterday the distinguished, the very distinguished, Senator from Rhode Island reached his 75th birthday. Oh, to be 75 again! I experienced that happy occasion 5 years ago. Today is the 23rd of October. In 27 more days I will reach my 80th birthday. Hopefully the Senate will be out of session because I don't want anything said about it. But I must congratulate this crusty New Englander, whom I admire hugely, on his having reached his 75th birthday. He is a great American. He is truly a fine Senator. As a man he is a real man. He is honest, and he is one who deals fairly with his colleagues right up on the board, straight across the board, nothing under the board, and he says what he thinks. If he agrees with one, he will agree; if he doesn't, he will say so, but he won't go out of this Chamber in any fit of distemper. It is a matter to be stated, and that is it. So I admire John Chafee. The people of his State are fortunate in having a man like John Chafee here. I think we are all fortunate in having a Senator like John Chafee. I greatly admire him. Let me just recall a few lines to a little poem titled the ``Multiplication Table of Happiness.'' I hope I can repeat it, having focused my thoughts on the line-item veto, the highway bill, and on the various other matters today. Count your garden by the flowers, Never by the leaves that fall; Count your days by the sunny hours, Not remembering clouds at all. Count your nights by stars, not shadows; Count your life by smiles, not tears; And on this beautiful October afternoon, Count your age by friends, not years. Now, after the distinguished Senator makes a response, if he feels that he has to--he doesn't--but if he wants to say anything--I saw him start to rise-- then I have a question back on the highway bill I wish to ask him.

Mr. BYRD. I can guarantee the Senator, I will never be in his State advocating that his people not vote for him, and if I'm up in his State, I will be glad to say what I have just said today about him.