Robert Byrd

Mr. BYRD

Mr. BYRD. Mr. President, will the Senator withhold?

Mr. BYRD

Mr. BYRD. Mr. President, on Tuesday, April 1, Mary Jane Ogilvie, the beloved wife of the Rev. Dr. John Lloyd Ogilvie, passed away. A light has gone out in the lives of the many people who were touched by her love, her dedication, and her compassion. Rev. Dr. John Lloyd Ogilvie, who served as the Senate Chaplain from March 3, 1995, until just this past month, was an unfailing source of support on many occasions to many of us in this Chamber, as well as to our families and our staff. He has been a compassionate spiritual advisor and a personal counselor during some of the most dangerous and trying times in the history of the Senate, including the horror of September 11 and the anthrax attack a few weeks later. I think it is fair to say that his unstinting service was heightened by, and a reflection of, the equal strength and understanding of Mrs. Ogilvie in their many years together. From what I know and understand, Mrs. Ogilvie was a kind, gentle woman, who exhibited indomitable courage and determination. Having dealt with illness in her own life, she was a source of inspiration and comfort in the lives of others. She was a petite woman, but her size belied a remarkable tenacity and will. Mrs. Ogilvie understood suffering, and she reached out to lessen the suffering of others. She was one of those special individuals who made life better and happier for all those who knew her. Mrs. Ogilvie did not seek the limelight. Her own effervescence and love for her husband and family and friends offered light enough. I am sure that those who grieve for her now will be comforted by the quiet memory of her shining, luminous life. Dr. Ogilvie will miss her. He will miss her very much. My own wife, Erma, and I extend to Dr. Ogilvie and his children--Scott, Heather, and Andrew--our deepest condolences and most heartfelt sympathies. Sometimes at eve when the tide is low, I shall slip my mooring and sail away, With no response to the friendly hail Of kindred craft in the busy bay; In the silent hush of the twilight pale, When the night stoops down to embrace the day And the voices call o'er the waters flow-- Sometimes at evening when the tide is low I shall slip my moorings and sail away. Through the purple shadows that darkly trail O'er the ebbing tide of the Unknown Sea, I shall fare me away, with a dip of sail And a ripple of waters to tell the tale Of a lonely voyager sailing away To Mystic Isles where at anchor lay The crafts of those who have sailed before O'er the Unknown Sea to the Unknown Shore. A few who have watched me sail away Will miss my craft from the busy bay; Some friendly barks that were anchored near, Some loving hearts that may heart held dear, In silent sorrow will drop a tear. But I shall have peacefully furled my sail In moorings sheltered from storm or gale, And greeted the friends who have sailed before O'er the Unknown Sea to the Unseen Shore. This bit of verse from Lizzie Clark Hardy I recall today in memory of Mrs. Ogilvie, and our dear friend the former Chaplain, Dr. Ogilvie.

Mr. BYRD

Mr. BYRD. Mr. President, I thank the very distinguished Senator from North Dakota.

Mr. BYRD

Mr. BYRD. How much time do I have?

Mr. BYRD. How much time remains?

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

Mr. BYRD. Forty.

Mr. BYRD. Mr. President, I send to the desk an amendment.

Mr. BYRD. Mr. President, I wish to speak in support of the amendment offered by Mr. Breaux. For many months now, the American people have been told that we are at war. We are at war in Iraq. We are at war here at home. We are at war against the al-Qaida terrorist network and other organizations like it. We are at war against terrorists who would use any means possible to destroy our Government, strike fear in our people, and cripple this great Nation. But, America is still woefully unprepared to prevent or respond to another terrorist attack. Despite the constant warnings from the Department of Homeland Security about terrorist threats here at home, and despite the obvious vulnerabilities, there are some in Congress who seem to want to put off sound investment for increased protections for our people. ``Hold off! Hold off! Wait for another day!'' they say. Mr. President, we may wait, but the terrorists, I fear, will not wait. The amendment before the Senate, which is offered by Mr. Breaux, would invest dollars now--today!--in some of the most critical areas of vulnerability here at home. The amendment offered by the Senator from Louisiana would provide $2.6 billion for border and transportation security, including $200 million for the Coast Guard, $35 million for the Bureau of Customs and Border Protection, $200 million for radiation detection equipment, $235 million for airport explosion detection systems, $300 million for mass transit security, $300 million for interoperable communications for first responders, $225 million for terrorism prevention at the Federal Bureau of Investigations, and funding to reimburse Department of Homeland Security expenses incurred as a result of Code Orange and to make up for fiscal year 2003 funding shortfalls at the Transportation Security Administration. A March 12, 2003, General Accounting Office report concluded that the Coast Guard faces ``fundamental challenges in meeting its new security- related responsibilities while rebuilding its capacity to accomplish other missions that have declined'' and that these challenges are made even more difficult by the heightened terror alert and by Coast Guard deployments to the Persian Gulf. In addition, a December 2002, GAO report identified more than $700 million in security needs at only eight transit agencies that were visited. The GAO concluded that, ``Obtaining sufficient funding is the most significant challenge in making transit systems as safe and secure as possible.'' Yet to date, no money--none--has been provided for transit security. If there is one lesson that we should learn from 9/11, it is that terrorist attacks on our Nation can no longer be viewed as distant threats across the oceans. The enemy may attack our troops, the enemy may attack our citizens overseas or civilians here at home. Clearly, we must provide all of the necessary resources to support our troops overseas. But we must also provide significant homeland security resources now to meet real needs that have been authorized by the Congress and signed into law by the President for port security, airport security, border security, and nuclear security. We should not accept the alarming deficiencies in our seaport security--an area that many experts have identified as perhaps the Nation's single greatest vulnerability. We should not accept the fact that our land borders are porous and that our airports simply cannot afford modern security equipment. We should not be satisfied that our cities and States--the front lines of this war at home--do not have sufficient equipment or expertise to handle wide- ranging threats involving madmen who may have gotten their hands on weapons of mass destruction. The danger is clear. The need is clear. I urge my colleagues to support the Breaux amendment. I yield back the remainder of my time.

Mr. BYRD. Absolutely.

Mr. BYRD. Mr. President, I sent to the desk an amendment and I asked unanimous consent that further reading be dispensed with, which was granted.

Mr. BYRD. Mr. President, my friend from Mississippi says the folks downtown want to participate. They did not want to participate last year when we asked the Secretary of Homeland Security--who is now the Secretary of Homeland Security--to appear. The President did not want to participate then. The President said: No, he shall not go up before that committee. So I say, Mr. President, once again, this administration is simply asking for too much authority. They want to participate? Well, this is not the first time administrations have wanted to participate. Under this Constitution, Congress has the power to appropriate funds. I say that Congress has not only the right, it has the responsibility to state how those funds shall be spent. We should not turn over the whole kit and caboodle to some unelected somebody down there, who will be the Secretary of Homeland Security. We transfer our responsibilities, we hand off our duties when we do that. This is an effort to stand by our constitutional duties, to stand by the taxpayers of the country who provide the money. This is our responsibility. We should say where these moneys will be spent, and we are doing that based on the testimony that was given to the Appropriations Committee last year. That is where we are getting our information. What is wrong with that? Why do Senators want to quarrel with that? It is the responsibility of Senators, I say to the distinguished Senator from Texas who is in the Chair. He shares that responsibility with the Senator from West Virginia and the Senator from North Carolina and the Senator from Mississippi. That is our responsibility. Why do we want to hand it over to some bureaucrat who is not elected by the people, who doesn't have to stand before the bar of judgment as we Senators do? Why do we want to hand that over to the administration? Just because the administration wants to have it? This administration, time and time again, has turned the back of its hand to Congress when Congress has made appropriations for homeland security--time and time again. We appropriated $2.5 billion last year, designated as an emergency, and that money would be out there in the hands of the local responders right today if this President hadn't turned the back of his hand on that and said: No, I refuse to attach my signature designating that as an emergency. So, there you have it. That is talk versus action. Mr. President, I hope Senators will support this amendment. Read the Constitution once again if need be, but take my word for it, that is in the Constitution. I hope Senators will stand up for the Constitution, stand up for the taxpayers. See, those taxpayers are looking right at us through those electronic lenses there. I say support this amendment. I yield the remainder of my time.

Mr. BYRD. Mr. President, on March 25, 2003, the President sent to Congress a $74.7 billion supplemental appropriations request for ``urgent and essential requirements'' for the costs of Operation Iraqi Freedom and for the global war on terrorism. In his request, the President sought an unprecedented level of flexibility in the use of those funds. This request was not only for the Secretary of Defense for the prosecution of the war in Iraq but also for the Secretary of Homeland Security and for the Attorney General. While I understand the unique circumstance in which the Nation finds itself, the situation is not entirely without precedent. We have been at war before. We have faced earthquakes and we have faced floods before. We have faced economic crises before. But the need to confront a crisis in a thoughtful or nimble way does not mandate that the Congress allow the executive branch to usurp its constitutional duties. The Constitution grants to the Congress the authority to appropriate funds and the responsibility to use that authority to make careful choices. Yet the President has asked the Congress to hand over its responsibility to the executive branch. The bill that is before the Senate includes $1.135 billion to be parceled out by the Secretary of Homeland Security for whatever purpose he believes is most appropriate. So will he use that authority to support the Coast Guard? Will he use that authority for border security or for port security? Will he give the money to States or to localities? Will he give it to first responders--police, fire, or emergency medical personnel in our communities? Or will he use it to build up a new bureaucracy? These are questions to which Congress should be seeking the answers. Congress itself must guard its prerogative and resist succumbing to expediency and to political partisanship. While I fully support the funding in this legislation for the men and the women who are engaged in battle in Iraq, I do not support additional grants of authority to this administration, or to any other administration, that would infringe upon the congressional power of the purse. Senator Stevens and I, together with the subcommittee chairmen and ranking members, have worked, in most cases, to improve the President's supplemental budget request. We have eliminated or reduced the sweeping grants of new authority requested by this administration, while still providing some very limited flexibility where appropriate. However, with regard to this unallocated fund for the Secretary of Homeland Security, we have not adequately protected the prerogatives of the Congress, nor have we done enough to protect our homeland. Time and again, the White House has argued that funding for securing our homeland can wait. When the Senate debated legislation to increase funding for homeland security just 2 months after the September 11 attacks, we tried to add money for homeland security, but the President said let's wait--let's wait until 2002. Then, in 2002, the Congress approved a $2.5 billion supplemental for first responders, for port security, border security, aviation security, and nuclear security, and the President refused to spend it. He claimed that homeland security could wait until 2003. Now it is 2003 and Senators on the other side of the aisle--some of them--are saying we are half way through the fiscal year; so let's wait until 2004. Well, I must ask the Senate, in the name of the people whom we represent, when will it be time to invest in securing our homeland? How much longer must we wait? The President proposes to put more than $1 billion in a fund for homeland security, but he does not tell us what the money will be used for. He does not tell us which agencies have requested funding. He provides us with no evaluations of those requests. He does not tell us when the money will be spent. For all we know, he may take the rest of this year to decide how the money will be spent so that he can reduce his spending request for fiscal year 2004. But who knows, he may just tell us that homeland security spending can wait until 2005. How can I reconcile this desire to wait, wait, wait, with the fact that the Secretary of Homeland Security has said that more terrorist attacks are inevitable and the threat of further attacks is a long-term threat to our Nation? I simply cannot reconcile his statements with the policies of this administration. This threat of terrorist attack will not end at the end of this war. So today, here is an amendment that does not add one thin dime to the bill. Instead, this amendment does what the Constitution--which we all swore to support and defend--compels us to do. This amendment makes choices. Last year, the Senate Appropriations Committee held 5 days of bipartisan hearings on homeland security. It was an excellent series of hearings where we heard from Governors, mayors, first responders, six cabinet officers, the Attorney General, and the Administrator of FEMA. In those hearings, we identified numerous gaps in our security. Based on those hearings and numerous reports, such as the nonpartisan Rudman- Hart report, my amendment, which I offered together with Senator Hollings, allocates the $1.135 billion contained in the committee bill for specific programs. More than $365 million would fund critical improvements at our seaports. Six million containers enter into the United States each year through our ports and very little is known about the contents of these containers or their shippers. There is no national system in place to track who is working within our own ports. This funding would begin to develop that system. The amendment would also pay for the installation of monitors at seaports to detect radiological, nuclear, chemical, biological substances, and weapons of mass destruction, without disturbing cargo. Additional equipment would expedite the inspection process. At the same time, we invest in port security teams and in other quick-response efforts should a terrorist strike at one of the Nation's seaports. We provide $150 million for mass transit and rail security. Transit systems throughout the world have historically been a top transportation target of terrorists. They are, by their nature, open systems used by a vast number of people and are very vulnerable to attack. With the exception of the Metro in the District of Columbia region, no money to date has been provided to our Nation's transit system to enhance security and reduce the vulnerability of these systems. Under the amendment, the Transportation Security Administration will receive $147 million for aviation security, while $55 million is directed toward the effort to find ways to protect commercial airplanes from missile attack. Another key part of this amendment is the $100 million directed toward interoperable communications equipment for police and fire departments. First responders need equipment that allows them to communicate with each other regardless of the team, the squadron, or the department to which they belong. Finally, there is funding totaling $75 million for the Secretary of Homeland Security to use for responding to unanticipated problems. The Secretary could draw on this fund by notifying the Congress 15 days in advance of spending the money. Mind you, this is no small sum. This is $75 million. This Congress can make intelligent choices and this Congress should make intelligent choices about how to use the taxpayers' dollars. We should not abrogate that responsibility by handing it off to unelected officials in Washington. I urge Members to support this amendment. Mr. President, I reserve the remainder of my time.

Mr. BYRD. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that Mr. Hollings be made a cosponsor.

Mr. BYRD. I thank my friend from South Carolina. He is a good listener. As far as I am concerned, he does not have any impediment in his speech. The Constitution invests the power of the purse, the control of the purse, here, in Congress, section 9, article I, of the Constitution. The Constitution does not say anything about letting some bureaucrat downtown--we all appreciate the fact we have to have bureaucrats, but nowhere do I swear it is important to defend the Department of Homeland Security when it comes to the allocation of the taxpayers' money. We are doing what we ought to do here. We are saying these funds are the taxpayers' money; Congress shall determine how they will be spent. Why should we turn over $1.3 billion to a Department and say to that Department head: You take it? That Department head does not appear on the ballot anywhere. He may have in times past. He was a good Governor, I suppose. I have a lot of respect for him. But nowhere does he appear before the elected representatives, before the electors in the various States. And we do. We have a responsibility to say where this money will be spent. We had hearings, as Senator Hollings has so ably pointed out. We had extensive hearings. We had six Department heads, we had the Attorney General, we had the Director of Homeland Security, we had mayors, we had Governors, we had local responders, we had firemen, we had policemen, we had emergency health personnel before the Appropriations Committee. Those hearings were well attended by Members on both sides of the aisle. My distinguished friend from Mississippi was there. We then reported out bills based on the hearings and the facts that were gleaned from those painstaking hearings, and in a great way that work was for naught. But here we are, we come back, and we are trying to say yes, we will respond, Mr. President. We will appropriate this money, but we are not just going to turn over a blank check to the Department of Homeland Security. That agency head--I have a lot of respect for him, as I say, but he was not allowed to come before our committee during those hearings. He was not allowed by this President. This President said, no, no, Mr. Ridge shall not appear before the Senate Appropriations Committee. Now are we willing to turn it over to Mr. Ridge and say: Here it is, lock, stock and barrel, the whole kit and caboodle; you have it; we will spend it; we will set ourselves aside. I am not willing to do that, I say with great respect to my friend from Mississippi, and he is my friend. We have a responsibility to say where this money is going to be spent, how it will be spent. We ought to live up to that responsibility. I hope Senators vote for the amendment.

Mr. BYRD. I yield.

Mr. BYRD. I wonder if it might be possible to get agreement that the vote would occur--the final passage would be voted at 9 o'clock.

Mr. BYRD. Mr. President, I would like to inquire as to whether or not, in the opinion of the distinguished manager of the bill, we might be able to finish action by no later than 9 o'clock?

Mr. BYRD

Mr. BYRD. The Senator does not owe me an apology.

Mr. BYRD. Will the Senator yield?

Mr. BYRD. Why don't we just finish this Tuesday?

Mr. BYRD. The Senator has always been courteous to me. I have no quarrel with him or any other Senator.

Mr. BYRD. Will the Senator yield?

Mr. BYRD. I thank the Chair.

Mr. BYRD. In the request that will be propounded with respect to the appointment of conferees, how many conferees on the part of the Senate is the chairman expecting?