Thomas Carper

Mr. CARPER

Mr. CARPER. I ask unanimous consent that the order for the quorum call be rescinded.

Mr. CARPER. Mr. President, I am delighted we finally have the opportunity to consider election reform. I am especially glad we are doing so in a way that is probably as close to bipartisan as anything we will work on this year. I commend Senator Dodd. I commend Senator McConnell and a number of other colleagues from both sides of the aisle who have worked diligently for a year now to hammer out this compromise we are considering today. As we all know, the 2002 elections brought to light a number of problems in the way we run elections. While Florida got a lot of attention, we found out the problems do not reside solely in Florida but persist in a number of other States as well. The bill that we will, hopefully, adopt this week goes a long way toward fixing not all those problems but a number of them. Let me mention a few. This legislation sets strong standards that State voting systems must meet so that all voting technology that American voters use allows them to correct mistakes and meet set error rates, acceptable lower error rates. This ensures voting machines are accessible to handicapped voters and voters with limited English proficiency. Third, this legislation provides for provisional balloting so voters mistakenly left off official registration lists are still allowed to vote. Fourth, this legislation provides for balanced antifraud measures to ensure voters are not disenfranchised. Fortunately, in my State of Delaware there were few problems on election day in 2002. Delaware has uniform electronic voting machines with good error rates. All of our precincts are called election districts. The machines were purchased during the time that I served as Governor of our State. Delaware also has a computerized statewide voter registration list put in place under the leadership of our former Election Commissioner, Thomas Cook. We have some work still to do in Delaware to assure our machines allow the handicapped to vote in privacy and to put a provisional voting system into place. Some States need to do a whole lot more than that. I am happy to see the bill provides the money to enable them and Delaware to do the work that needs to be done. This bill includes no unfunded mandates. This bill provides $3 billion in grants to pay 100 percent of the costs to States for implementing the voting machines or provisional balloting and for antifraud requirements. We must work hard to ensure, however, that the money we are promising, the money we propose to authorize, actually gets to the States and that there are enough dollars at the end for the States to meet the requirements we are placing on them, especially now that a number of States, including my own, are faced with very tight budgets. According to the National Governors Association, combined State budget shortfalls are at $15 billion and could go higher if State unemployment, health care, and homeland security costs continue to rise. Most States have balanced budget requirements in their constitution and face the prospect of having to raise taxes or make budget cuts to cover the budget shortfalls. Having said that, this is a good bill. In fact, this is more than a good bill; it is a very good bill. I am pleased to urge my colleagues to join me and others to pass it overwhelmingly. I hope at the end of the day if we begin to see in the future that States continue to have problems meeting these new standards for budgetary reasons that emanate more from Washington than our State capitals, we find a way to get those States the resources they need or, if necessary, to amend the timing of requirements so that States can meet those requirements responsibly. I yield.

Mr. CARPER

Mr. CARPER. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent to be recognized for 5 minutes to speak as in morning business.

Mr. CARPER

Mr. CARPER. Madam President, earlier this afternoon, an hour or so ago on this floor, we adopted a new farm policy for our country. In Delaware, in Michigan, even in Connecticut and Kansas, farmers are struggling to try to make a go of it. Some of the woes that our agricultural communities face are laid at the foot of the agricultural policy which was adopted by the Congress, I believe, in 1996. I would just observe that some of the problems our farmers face may be fairly attributable to that national farm policy. But not all of the woes of agricultural communities can be traced back to the legislation adopted some 6 years ago. In my own view, the bigger problem is overproduction. In my own view, the bigger problem is we have too much commodity and not enough demand for that commodity, whether the commodity is corn or soybeans, the commodity is milk or rice or cotton or beef--even chicken. We have too much commodity and not enough demand, too much commodity produced in this country and around the world. The bill we have just passed provides subsidies to support those who are raising major crops, including corn, soybeans, rice, and cotton. Those supports--loan prices--are important. But the answer to what ails our farms and our agricultural communities is not merely more subsidies or greater subsidies. The answer, I believe, ultimately is better alignment of supply and demand. Let me mention a few ways we can do that. One is through biomass. At a time when our country is importing about 60 percent of the oil we use, we also live in an age where you can take soybean oil and mix it with diesel fuel and provide a perfectly good fuel for diesel vehicles. We can do a similar thing with corn for ethanol vehicles. We are learning how to transform plants into factories. We can now raise plants that will create an enzyme that is otherwise created in a chemical factory. The plants literally enable you to produce the same enzyme 40 percent cheaper than might be produced with a chemical factory, with fewer negative environmental consequences. We learned how to infect or inject a virus into a product or crop such as soybeans or even tobacco, and the plant then creates a vaccine which can be used, among other things, to fight cancer. The folks at DuPont have recently perfected a soybean seed that grows a soybean that produces soy milk that is almost impossible to distinguish from regular milk with respect to its taste. Those are just some of the things we can do to create more demand, untraditional demand for the enormous amount of commodities, farm commodities we are producing in this country and in other places. I add to those, we found out in Delaware, as we clean out our chicken houses, we can take some of the chicken litter and, instead of spreading it on our farm fields, we can burn it and derive a Btu value for electricity, and do so in an environmentally clean way. We can take the chicken litter out of chicken houses and treat it under high temperature and make a high nitrogen/high phosphorus fertilizer and ship it across the country and across the world and provide a source of cash revenue for farmers from what was previously a waste product of which we had too much. One of the aspects I especially like about the bill we passed is it supplements and supports the efforts of States such as Delaware and perhaps others here to preserve agricultural land through conservation. In my State, we have invested tens of millions of dollars, State dollars in recent years, to purchase agricultural development rights, providing money for farmers for farm equipment, irrigation systems, and other ways to support their farming operation by agreeing to put their farms in perpetuity in farmland. It is going to continue to be a farm forever. This legislation we passed here today provides Federal support for what many of us have done at the State level. The last thing is companies such as DuPont and Syngenta and others in our country have developed ways to create seeds and to grow plants that are more drought resistant than otherwise would be, plants and seeds that are resistant to a particular kind of inspect, plants that need fewer fertilizers, less fertilizer, less insecticides, less pesticides. We have the ability, through that kind of research and the application of that research, to build a better mousetrap--if not a better mousetrap, a better soybean plant, and to enable us to have a leg up on the competition in other parts of the world. Those are some of the things, some of the factors that will enable us to help revive our agricultural industry in this country. There are a lot of good things in that farm bill that we passed. Part of the solution, part of the way out of the duress in which farmers find themselves, is in that legislation. But a good deal is not. I wanted to share some of my thoughts today, and I thank the Chair for indulging me.

Mr. CARPER

Mr. CARPER. Mr. President, earlier this morning--in fact, just a few minutes ago--our colleague from Georgia, Senator Miller, spoke quite eloquently about a patient on life support and said the life support was about to be withdrawn. The patient in his comments was the economic stimulus package we have been trying to negotiate since October. I like his analogy, but I think he may not have picked the right patient. The patient we have been trying to bring back to health is not a stimulus package. The patient that has been in the hospital bed has been the economy. We have had a sick economy, and we have been working to try to figure out how we might ensure the full, complete, and healthy recovery of that economy. Today, we pull the plug, if you will, from that recovering economy. We pull the plug on hope for a stimulus package. It is not going to happen. I do not think we ought to spend our time today, tomorrow, or this week casting aspersions--Democrats on Republicans or vice versa. There has been a lot of good will and a lot of effort exerted in October, November, December, January, and even earlier this month by both sides, people of good will trying to figure out how we infuse capital investments, how we reach out to those who lost their health care, how we reach out to those who are losing unemployment benefits, how we help States that are struggling financially right now. There is an old saying which I think everybody has used once or twice: The first rule is do no harm. By essentially walking away from this debate today, we will have done no harm. Had we been able to act in October, November, or December with a reasonable package that was consistent with the three principles we talked about for the last 4 or 5 months--a stimulus should be temporary, it should be truly stimulative, and it should not exacerbate the deficit over the long haul--if we could have come to agreement on that and presented a package for the President's signature, that would have been fine. We just could not do that. Now we face a time when the Federal Reserve has launched the most aggressive monetary policy, ratcheting down interest rates for the last year, infusing extra money in our money supply, a drop in energy prices that fueled economic recovery and shortened the recession, and we have been doing a lot of deficit spending. Those three factors, rather than harm, have done great good. Because of those three factors, as we disconnect from the patient, if you will, this hope of a stimulus package--the economy itself--the patient is going to get well. The patient is going to check out of the hospital and go on to live, hopefully, a reasonably long, healthy life until we have another economic downturn. Meanwhile, as we turn our attention from the economic recovery and the need for a stimulus package, I would have us keep this in mind: If by a miracle we were able to pass a stimulus package today, before it would have effect, a couple months are going to go by. It has taken almost 12 months for the full force of the monetary policy, the interest rate cuts of the Fed to have their impact, but they are having it today. Now the Federal Reserve is reversing course. Instead of cutting interest rates when they met last week, they decided not to further their cuts in interest rates. Before long, they are going to be turning their attention not to how we get the economy moving again but how do we dampen down inflationary expectations. Congress is real good at coming in when the recession is basically over and passing a package which, in the end, will probably be inflationary, and what we really do not want to do is have the Federal Reserve working in a few months on the other side of the domestic monetary policy trying to dampen inflationary expectations by raising interest rates at the same time that a stimulus package from the Congress, adopted late, begins to have an effect. We will be at cross- purposes, which we do not need. I am encouraged, I am bullish on the economy. I know people are suffering today. I hope we can pass at least an extension of short-term benefits for 13 weeks and help people. That will stimulate the economy and, more importantly, it will help people who are suffering. Another action we can take--and I hope we will--to promote a healthy recovery for an extended period of time--not a couple of months or a couple of years--is as we go into these investigations as to what led to the collapse of Enron and what led to people losing their pensions, their 401(k)s, to do the hard work, the long work, the steady work that is required to find out why things went wrong at Enron, why so many people got hurt, and how we can ensure that does not happen again to a company, to its employees, to those who invest in a company, and those whose pensions are tied to a company. We can do that. Today, as we walk away from this economic recovery package, I just want to say a word of thanks to a lot of people who worked very hard to try to get us to a consensus. We could not get there. It is not the end of the economic recovery. I think we are just beginning that economic recovery, and I am encouraged that it will continue and we will have done no harm.

Mr. CARPER

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

Mr. CARPER. Mr. President, I am not interested in casting aspersions today at the work of our Republican friends with respect to the economic recovery package. I think, for the most part, they have entered into this in good faith. Senator Grassley of Iowa has worked hard, as has Senator Baucus of Montana, to try to craft a consensus package that we can all agree to--or at least 60 of us can--which would have a beneficial effect. I wanted to speak briefly and reflect back for a moment on the principles that we adopted on a bipartisan basis last fall as we approached the creation of an economic recovery package. There are really three principles that come to mind. One is that whatever we came up with should be temporary in nature; second, there should truly be stimulative of our economy; three, it should not exacerbate long term the budget deficit of our Nation. I can stand here along with any of our colleagues, certainly the Presiding Officer, and think of any number of items I would like to include in a stimulus package that are not included in the four-part proposal put forth by the majority leader. He has suggested a 13-week extension in unemployment insurance benefits; a tax rebate for those who did not receive a tax rebate previously and who are very likely to spend that money sooner rather than later; bonus depreciation incentive for businesses to renew capital investment, which has been lacking for the last year or more now; and fiscal relief for States with respect to their health care costs. My State of Delaware and other States are having a very difficult time as the rolls of the unemployed rise, as the numbers of people who are eligible for Medicaid rise, and States need help with that. As I look through that list of four proposals Senator Daschle has put forward, I see in those proposals ideas that are essentially temporary, that are stimulative, and do not exacerbate our fiscal situation long term. If we are going to do something in this regard--we have been dancing this dance for a long time--we need to get on with it. I applaud our leader for bringing it up early on, but if we do not do something soon, it is really too late. When we were in economic recovery and expansion during the 1990s, a lot of people thought it was going to last forever. We know it did not. Similarly, people think that when we are in a recession it will last forever, too, and we know from history that recessions do not last forever either. The history of recessions since World War II is that they are generally a year and a half long; most are 12 months in duration. We have been in this one for almost 12 months. I think one of the reasons the landing has been as soft as it has been--and I know it has not been for everyone--one of the reasons this recession is not as deep as it otherwise might have been is because of some of the most aggressive monetary policy by the Federal Reserve I have witnessed in my lifetime, maybe the most aggressive policy which is now being felt in our economy. Second, we have seen prices drop precipitously from a year ago. It is not just the price of gasoline we put in our cars, trucks, and vans, but it is the price of the heating oil we are using to heat our homes this winter. Even natural gas prices are down dramatically. We feel good about those things psychologically, but also they have a material effect on our economic well-being and our pocketbooks. A third piece that is kicking in to help lessen the severity of the recession is the amount of spending we are doing. We are spending a lot of money, and we are spending it, for the most part, on the right things--the war in Afghanistan, the war against terrorism around the world, trying to help the folks of New York recover and rebuild, trying to make sure the airline industry does not end up in a real depression with massive layoffs and closings. Those three things taken together--aggressive monetary policy by the Fed, much lower energy prices, and the deficit spending we are already doing--combine to help, if not lift, the economy to at least reduce the depth to which it is dropping. I am personally bullish about the economy. I think there is a pretty good chance come spring we will be coming out of this recession. Some have said it will be a jobless recovery and maybe mirror what we had in 1990, 1991, and 1992. My sense is we will probably be coming out of it sooner rather than later. The Federal Reserve will meet next week. They will debate whether or not to lower interest rates again by maybe another quarter of a percent. I have no crystal ball. I am not sure what they are going to do. They can do that or make no change at all. The time will come when the concerns of the recession will give way to inflationary concerns. If we wait too long for this stimulus package, we are going to put ourselves in the position of instead of being in concert with the Federal Reserve's monetary policy where we pass a package that supports what the Federal Reserve does, we are going to be offering a package that will stimulate the economy which is already on the rebound and the Federal Reserve's concerns will move to not so much how do we get the economy moving, but how do we dampen down inflationary expectations. I said to our leader any number of times: No bill is better than a bad bill with respect to economic recovery. What he has proposed is not a bad bill. I believe it is quite a good proposal. As I said earlier, I can certainly offer changes that I would like to see adopted that might make it better. Frankly, so could our Republican friends as well. This bare-bones approach works for me, but more important, I believe it will work for our country. It will provide the insurance policy along with the Federal Reserve monetary policy, along with the energy price drops, along with the spending we are already doing to make sure when we do get into this spring that the economic recovery we are hoping for will actually materialize. We have been joined in the Chamber by Senator Baucus of Montana, chairman of the Finance Committee. I spoke of him when he was not in the Chamber. I now thank him in person. No one has put more time, energy, and effort into trying to develop a package with respect to the economic recovery of our country than Senator Baucus. I wanted to express my thanks to him for the great work he has done. My hope is we can move from this proposal today and actually adopt it, but if we cannot and if we do not, I want him to know he has my respect and certainly my thanks. I yield the floor.

Mr. CARPER

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

Mr. CARPER. Mr. President, I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. CARPER

Mr. CARPER. Mr. President, I rise because we have passed the 13th conference report on the 13 appropriations bills. As we prepare to return to our home States, everyone here in the Chamber and everyone in the Senate can find some aspect of the conference report on Defense to which to object. In the end, what we have to do is consider the work as a whole--as a complete body of work--and make our judgments on it as not any one single item or issue but the whole notion of how we protect our Nation's interests across the globe. On that, this measure deserves my support, and has gotten my support, and obviously the support of a majority of our colleagues. As we dispose of the conference report on the Defense appropriations bill, I regret that we leave behind other issues involving security for our country at home. I want to mention those today. I hope before we adjourn at the end of this day, we will have had the opportunity to bring to this floor several measures that will be brought up by unanimous consent, and I hope with no objection. One of those deals with the security of our ports. As it turns out, for the hundreds of ports across and around our Nation where ships travel in and out of them every single week, the security we provide for those ports and for the people who live in the areas around those ports is inadequate. The opportunity for someone to bring terrorist devices into our ports and into heavily populated areas possibly is very real. It is one that we currently do not address well, and we need to. The Senate Commerce Committee, under the leadership of Senator Hollings, has reported out legislation, I believe unanimously, on port security. It needs to come before this body and to be considered before we ultimately adjourn. Secondly, on the issue of airport security, aircraft security has been debated and I think satisfactorily addressed by the House and Senate and by the President. Many people in this part of the country, and around the country, travel by railroad. We leave undone, at least at this moment, issues that ought to be addressed with respect to rail security, the security of people who are traveling on railroads as passengers around our Nation. Again, the Commerce Committee, under the leadership of Senator Hollings, has reported out, I believe unanimously, legislation dealing with rail security. It is an important issue, and not just for those of us in the Northeast corridor; it is an important issue for our Nation. And we know, as the Presiding Officer does, there are hundreds of thousands of people who travel literally every day through tunnels that go in and out of New York, under Baltimore, and under this city that are not too secure, are not well ventilated or well lit, and are not well protected. This measure would help to address that, along with better surveillance of our bridges, providing better and more adequate security aboard our trains. My hope is that before we leave this day, before the Senate sets this day, we will have taken up this measure by unanimous consent and approve it in the Senate. There was objection a few moments ago to another unanimous consent request which was made with respect to antiterrorism reinsurance. Other nations around the globe have been the target of terrorist attacks, and damage has been suffered from those attacks for many years. For us, fortunately, the experience of September 11 had never visited this country before. We have not had to trouble ourselves with determining how we provide adequately for insurance in the event of a terrorist attack. Other countries deal with this differently. In Israel and the United Kingdom, which have had terrorist attacks for many years, those countries have their own approach. In Israel, for example, the country provides the insurance for the terrorist attacks. The Banking Committee and the Commerce Committee both have sought to craft legislation to say there ought to be a backstop with respect to antiterrorism legislation, that initially the insurance companies themselves should put up money and absorb the losses, to the tune of $10 or $15 billion, but after that there should be a sharing of the costs that grow out of terrorist attacks. The Federal Government should share that. It is unfortunate we were not able to proceed with this legislation today, and it is imperative we take it up as soon as we return. The last point is with respect to other unfinished business. When terrorists attacked us on September 11, they didn't just take people's lives in New York, the Pentagon, and in Pennsylvania; they struck a body blow to our economy. We are still reeling, to some extent, from that body blow. The work of the Federal Reserve on monetary policy helps us with respect to that body blow. The fact that energy prices have fallen so much helps us with respect to that body blow. The fact that we are spending, frankly, a lot of money with deficit spending, in order to fight terrorism here and across the country and around the world, provides stimulus to the economy and helps to reduce the length of time under which we will likely have a recession. There is one other thing we could have done, and ought to have done, besides the terrorism reinsurance proposal that has been objected to, and that was to pass an economic recovery plan. That, I think, had broad bipartisan support by Democrats and Republicans. It would have accelerated depreciation and gotten businesses back into the business of making capital investment. It would have provided a payroll tax holiday for businesses and employees as well. It would have provided extensions of unemployment insurance and helped folks on the health insurance side. It would have helped States that are reeling at this point in time. Unfortunately, we have not had the opportunity to debate that today and to pass a true bipartisan plan. So we go home with half a loaf. We go home with half a loaf, but, as the Presiding Officer knows, we will come back next month. And as we come back next month, my hope is, if we have not dealt satisfactorily with railroad security and port security today, if we have not dealt with antiterrorism reinsurance today, as it appears we will not, that once we return we will take that up. I thank the Chair.

Mr. CARPER

Mr. CARPER. My two colleagues from New Jersey are correct in their assessment of the importance of this $2 million appropriation for smokeless nitrocellulose. Earlier this year, an anti-competitive joint venture, which would have centralized the production of this key ingredient in Defense Department programs, threatened Green Tree. Indeed, had the Federal Trade Commission not found the joint venture to be monopolistic, Green Tree would have been forced to close its New Jersey plant. The provision was inserted to the conference report to serve the same purpose as an amendment added to the Senate DoD appropriations bill to provide Green Tree with a $2 million production grant. By including this vital provision, Congress will ensure the survival of Green Tree and enhance and sustain the competitive domestic production base for smokeless nitrocellulose which plays a key role in many DoD weapons programs.

Mr. CARPER

Mr. CARPER. I ask unanimous consent that the order for the quorum call be rescinded.

Mr. CARPER

Mr. CARPER. Mr. President, I begin by thanking Senator Kennedy for his kind words. A year ago this month, I was privileged to be in Austin, TX, at the Governor's house for a fellow who had that day stepped down as Governor of Texas and was about to become President of the United States. There were any number of Senators present that day, a number of Representatives from the U.S. House of Representatives, and one sitting Governor--that was me. Absent from those in attendance that day was Senator Kennedy. We spent the better part of an afternoon discussing with the new President-elect what kind of changes we should make to the educational system in our country. I remember returning from that meeting, that extended discussion, and calling Senator Kennedy on the phone to share with him a little bit of what took place in his absence. I recall reading almost a year ago there were some in this city who were saying education reform would be at the forefront of the President's agenda, and that a good deal of it would take place with or without the involvement of the ranking member and now chairman of the committee, Senator Kennedy. As it turns out, Senator Kennedy ended up being in the center of the action. He and his staff helped to shape, in no small part, the agenda. I want to express my thanks to him for his support and his acceptance of provisions offered by Senator Gregg and myself with respect to public school choice and charter schools. I say to Senator Gregg, who is present today, how much I appreciate the opportunity to be his ally, to make sure that as we assess the schools in this country and provide leadership in Washington, we not only support the States in establishing strong standards and assessing student performance, but also empower parents by giving them greater choices as to where their children will go to school. I want to mention a few others who played an important role in shaping this bill and in supporting the measures that Senator Gregg and I advanced with respect to public school choice and charter schools. We have already heard from Senator Bayh. Later, I suspect we will hear from Senator Lieberman, Senator Landrieu, and Senator Frist, all of whom played an incredibly important part in the conference and in the debate on this legislation. I want to also recognize a few of my old colleagues in the House of Representatives, including Chairman Boehner and Congressman Miller, who have been mentioned, as well as some Members who have not been mentioned. To Mike Castle from Delaware, Tim Roemer of Indiana, Rob Andrews from New Jersey, and Heather Wilson of New Mexico, I want to say a special thanks for the great work they have done to give us a solid compromise. And I take my hat off to the President. He has made this his primary initiative coming out of the starting block and has done wonderful work, along with Sandy Kress, Margaret Spelling, and others from the White House staff. If I could draw a rough analogy to a war going on on the other side of the world, the military campaign in Afghanistan, we are providing more money for our military operations. We are saying to those leading that operation: We will give you significant flexibility in how you use the resources. We will not try to micromanage the war from Washington. But we are going to hold you accountable for results. If you think about this legislation, in an effort to ensure better results from our schools in America, we have agreed with the President to provide more money for our schools. We have agreed to provide that money with greater flexibility to be used in our schools as our school leaders at the local level believe is best suited to raise student achievement. And we have agreed that, while we will provide that money, more money with greater flexibility, we will demand results. We will not throw good money after bad. We want results. There will be consequences for those schools that do well and consequences for those that do not. That is the basic compact at the heart of this legislation--greater funding and greater flexibility in exchange for greater accountability for results. Beyond this, we have added measures to target federal dollars where the need is the greatest. We have also included report cards for parents, report cards that will give them the information they need to assess the performance of the schools their children attend. We do this because we want to empower parents to make choices for their children and we want to bring market forces to bear, competition to bear, within our public schools. If we had debated this legislation 6, 7, 8, or 9 years ago, we might have come at it in a different way. A decade or so ago, I know of no State which had adopted rigorous academic standards--no State that had spelled out what they expected their children to know and be able to do in reading, writing, math, and social studies. Today, all but one State in America has adopted rigorous academic standards, spelling out what they expect their students to know. A decade or so ago, we didn't have States that had developed tests to measure student progress. Today, over half the States have developed those tests. In my State and other States, we measure student progress each and every year. A decade or so ago, we did not have accountability systems in place. We did not have systems in place that said we will hold schools accountable and responsible: for those that meet the grade, there are certain rewards; for those that do not, there are certain consequences. Today, almost half the States in America have adopted accountability systems. A decade or so ago, if we had taken this legislation up, we would probably have said: The Federal Government should write the standards; we are smart enough in Washington to write the standards and impose those on the States. We have not done that in this legislation. This legislation acknowledges that the States have spent a lot of time, effort, and energy with the input of some of the best and brightest teachers, business leaders, and scientists--working to develop their own academic standards to measure student progress. In this legislation we say to the States: You develop the standards, you determine how quickly you will move over the next 12 years to get up to those standards, but once you have done that, we will hold you responsible for moving all kids up to the standards--kids from the best communities, with the highest per capita income, as well as those from the toughest communities. A decade or so ago, we might have provided the money and said to our schools and school districts: By the way, here is the money, and this is exactly how you have to spend it. We don't do that in the context of this legislation. We say: Here is extra money. Roughly half the money we will provide will be provided in ways that give you more flexibility. If it makes more sense to use the for before- or afterschool programs, do that. If it makes more sense to use the money to provide full day kindergarten, do that. Or for prekindergarten training, do that. But in the end, however you decide to use the resources, we want and demand results. Now, let me talk briefly about public school choice and charter schools. In the State of Delaware, as Governor, I signed into law legislation making Delaware the first State to go to statewide public school choice. I will never forget hearing a conversation between school administrators shortly after we signed that legislation into law. One administrator was heard saying: If we do not offer students and parents what they want in our schools, they will go somewhere else. If we don't offer students and parents what they want in our schools, they will go somewhere else. In Delaware, they can do that. They take the money to another school. The money from the State taxpayer follows the students. We have injected competition and market forces into our public schools in ways that might have seemed impossible half a dozen years ago. The legislation we are debating, and will hopefully pass this week, says there will be consequences flowing from the annual tests given in grades 3 through 8. Among the consequences of a school failing to make progress toward their own standards, at the rate they have said they will make it, is that parents are given an alternative. We will provide assistance to help turn around the school, but public school choice becomes an option for parents after that second year that the school fails to make adequate progress. Transportation money is also provided so that a student can actually go from school A to school B if that is where they want to go. If school B gives a better education, the transportation money to get that child from school A to school B must be provided. Having dealt as Governor with public schools through the turmoil of public school choice and the challenges of its implementation, I know it is not easy. I am grateful to Senators Kennedy and Gregg for ensuring we provide the necessary resources to help schools and school districts to make that difficult transition to public school choice. After 4 years, if a school continues to fail students--if it fails to make adequate progress toward their State's standards--not only are parents provided with the option of public school choice, but that school has to be reconstituted. That school has to be closed, it has to be taken over by the State or by a business interest, or that school has to be turned into a charter school. As a State with a number of charter schools I know that charter schools provide wonderful educational opportunities for children in some of the most disadvantaged communities in America. However, we do not provide much help to charter schools to finance their facilities. We ought to. It is the number one challenge facing charter schools today--preventing new charter schools from opening and preventing successful ones from expanding. With this legislation, we provide some help at the Federal level to assist charter schools in accessing the credit markets and leveraging private capital. We also provide new incentives to encourage States to treat charters like other public schools and provide them with equitable funding for facilities. Let me conclude with one last thought. One of our sports heroes, especially this time of year as we play football on Sunday, is a fellow no longer with us, Vince Lombardi. He used to say about football: Unless you are keeping score, you are just practicing. In Delaware and States across American we have begun to keep score. We set the standards. We measure student progress. We are keeping score. We are trying to figure out what works and provide more money for those things that work. This is a tough-love approach. Sometimes on our side of the aisle we are viewed as just wanting to throw more money at every problem. We are all love. Sometimes those on the other side of the aisle are viewed as just being tough, as not willing to provide the resources that are needed in a loving way. The beauty of this legislation--and it is not perfect by anyone's judgment--is that it takes the toughness and it mixes it with a measure of love. We commit to investing greater resources on behalf of students in this country and in return we demand improvement. As a result, we emerge as a full partner with the States and the school districts across our country that are doing a whole lot of wonderful things to raise student achievement. I am convinced that no piece of Federal legislation will solve all of our problems with respect to schools. We are a minority partner with respect to public education. But with this legislation, and hopefully with the funding that will follow this week in the appropriations bill, we will be a more meaningful partner from Washington, DC, from our Nation's Capital, than we have ever been in the past. For everyone who has worked hard to get us to this day--Sean Barney, a member of my staff, Danica Petroshius and Michael Meyers of Senator Kennedy's staff, Michele Stockwell and Elizabeth Fay of Senator Lieberman's staff and Senator Bayh's staff respectively, and Denzel McGuire and Townsend McNitt of Senator Gregg's staff--my heartfelt thanks for a job very well done on behalf of all of our students. I yield the floor.

Mr. CARPER

Mr. CARPER. Will the Senator yield?

Mr. CARPER

Mr. CARPER. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that Pat Jones, a legislative fellow who serves on my staff, be granted floor privileges during the deliberation of this bill.

Mr. CARPER

Mr. CARPER. May I make a unanimous-consent request to address the Senate for 1 minute as in morning business.

Mr. CARPER

Mr. CARPER. Madam President, Senator Inouye has been a good friend and mentor to this new Senator, as has a Senator I call ``Mr. Secretary,'' the former Secretary of the Navy, Senator Warner from Virginia, who also has been a good counselor and advisor to me. When these two Senators stood and entered the armed services six decades ago almost, they raised their arms and took an oath to defend our Constitution against all enemies, foreign and domestic. They participated in a war that brought us in the 20th century to become the great Nation we are today. Sixty years ago today, Pearl Harbor was bombed. Two hundred fourteen years ago today, the Constitution which they took an oath to defend was first ratified by any State in the United States of America. Two hundred fourteen years ago today, in a place called the Golden Fleece Tavern in Dover, DE, about 30 delegates who had been there for 3 days debating what steps to take decided that Delaware should be the first State to ratify our Constitution and provide the foundation which has enabled our Nation to survive World War I and World War II, the Korean war, the Vietnam war, the war against communism, to win the battle against the Great Depression. We are fighting another war on terrorism around the world and here in this country and other places. That Constitution, which provides us with our three branches of Government--the legislative branch, of which we are one-half, the executive branch, and the judicial branch--the most enduring of any constitution in the world, which provides the foundation for the longest living democracy in the history of the world, was first ratified today 214 years ago. Any country that can survive two world wars and a civil war and the Great Depression, vanquish the Communists, we can certainly handle the terrorists, and we can handle the issues that divide us here today. I am confident we will.

Mr. CARPER

Mr. CARPER. Madam President, let me begin by saying plainly and unabashedly that I love our flag. I wear an American flag lapel pin to work every single day. We fly ``Old Glory'' at our home throughout the year and display it proudly in each of my Senate offices. The American flag is even displayed on the minivan that I drive all over our State. It is the symbol of our freedom and a reflection of our pride in our great Nation. But while our flag is the symbol of our freedom, our Nation's Constitution is its guarantee. It is the foundation on which was built the longest living experiment in democracy in the history of the world. Though written by man, I believe it to be divinely inspired. Before beginning 23 years of service as a naval flight officer, I took the same oath as each of the men and women now fighting overseas. We swore to protect our Nation's safety and honor and defend our Constitution against all enemies both foreign and domestic. The men and women of our armed forces past and present each pledged to lay down their lives in defense of the freedoms our Constitution provides. I can think of no greater honor, no more solemn a commitment, than this pledge. On a cold December 7, 214 years ago, Delawareans stood proudly and declared their belief in the right of self-government by becoming the first to ratify the United States Constitution. Each year we celebrate this act of leadership, courage, and wisdom. While our constitution has proved the most durable model for democracy, at the time, it was a revolutionary and some thought risky step forward. For the power of its words and the brilliance of its logic is matched only by the astounding scope of what it sought to achieve, to ``establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defense, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity.'' It was truly a miraculous undertaking, and we celebrate that Delaware had the courage to lead the world in embracing this new standard excellence in self-government. But as we reflect on this bold step towards freedom, there is a stain on our celebration. After the Constitution's ratification, the Bill of Rights sought to provide greater and more lasting liberties than any single document before or since. In 1789, the Federal Government sent the articles that would make up the Bill of Rights to States for ratification. While other States sent their approval of ratification back to the Federal Government on separate parchment, in their enthusiasm, Delaware's leaders signed their approval directly on their copy of the document and returned it to the Federal Government. While other states are now able to display their copies of the original Bill of Rights, Delaware's is locked in a drawer in the National Archives near College Park, Maryland. Our State and this document deserve better. I call today on the National Archives to return this copy of the Bill of Rights to its place of ratification. I ask that in the spirit of celebration surrounding Delaware Day, the National Archives return to us this important part of our State's history. We are witnessing a time of renewed respect for our Nation at home and abroad. In fact, in all of my life, I've never witnessed a warmer embrace of our flag or a greater sense of pride for our country than we've seen since September 11. Almost everywhere we turn, we see signs of this renewed national pride on our homes, office buildings, factories, schools, construction sites, on the vehicles we drive, and as well at thousands of sporting events, parades and gatherings across our country. A spirit of patriotism has swept across our Nation in a way that I've never seen. It is both comforting and inspiring to me and, I know, to Americans everywhere. This December, let us pause in thanks to those wise Delawareans who started our Nation along the road to becoming the most successful and long-lasting democracy in world history. They gave us a great gift for which we, and much of the world, will be forever thankful.

Mr. CARPER

Mr. CARPER. Madam President, I agree with my friend from Oklahoma on several of the comments he just made. We can ill afford, even in the environment in which we live today, to forget about fiscal restraint and the responsibility to manage our finances, not only in the short term but in the long-term. But it is not just spending that we need to watch. It is also the nature of the tax cuts that we have adopted and the ones we are considering adopting as part of the economic stimulus package. Let me take a somewhat different approach to the legislation before us, for which we are now considering the step of waiving the Budget Act. I thank Senator Baucus for bringing the measure to the floor. I thank our leader for bringing this measure to the floor. I salute Senator Hatch and others who have introduced the legislation, which I have cosponsored. I am not aware of anywhere in the Federal Government where we have a private sector type of pension plan. The railroad retirement is somewhat difficult to understand. Let me take a minute and contemplate what it is and what it is not. The railroad retirement, which provides retirement benefits for hundreds of thousands of railroaders and their survivors, is a two-tier plan. Tier 1 deals with Social Security benefits, or reflects and mirrors Social Security benefits. We are not talking about addressing or dealing with those. Tier 2 is a pension plan that goes beyond Social Security benefits. Most people who work in the private sector in this country realize Social Security benefits. They also have a pension plan, in many cases, from their own employer. Those employers contribute to those plans. The employees contribute to their employer's pension plan established for them. Most employers, private sector employers and, frankly, most public sector employers around the country who have pension plans--the moneys that go into those plans are invested, but they are not invested exclusively in securities issued by the U.S. Treasury. Tier 2 of the railroad retirement plan is different because the moneys that are contributed by the employers--the railroad companies-- and moneys contributed by employees of those railroads to the pension fund, the trust fund, are invested only in securities issued by the U.S. Treasury. Many States and local governments have changed the way they invest their pension moneys. They have invested now in equities, corporate stocks, and other investment options because the yield there is greater and they are able to provide better benefits and reduce their contribution into their pension fund. The question before us in this bill is, Should we provide the same kind of flexibility for railroad companies and railroad retirees when contributing to their tier 2 pension plans? Should we give them the same flexibility that is enjoyed by other employers throughout the country? I believe we should. The question also is, In doing that, does that somehow cause an outlay by the Federal Government? We still work in the Federal Government under a cash basis of accounting. Most companies and, in fact, almost all State and local governments use the accrual form of accounting. If we use an accrual form of accounting, my guess is we would not be debating whether or not this is actually a $15 billion cash outlay. I think the point would be moot. But we still use the cash basis, so that is the law under which we operate. Having said that, we are not talking about the need to spend another $15 billion to build roads. We are not talking about another $15 billion to provide better health care. We are not talking about another $15 billion to provide better environmental protection. We are talking about a step here that says to the folks who oversee tier 2 pension funds contributed to by employers--the railroad companies--and the railroad employees: You don't have to just invest the money in your trust fund in U.S. Treasury obligations. You can invest in other kinds of investments, such as securities, which would provide a greater yield, and then that anticipated yield, which has been proven over history, that greater yield will enable that pension fund to provide better benefits to railroad retirees and to their survivors. That anticipated greater yield--again, proven historically --would enable the railroad companies, the employers, and the employees-- particularly the railroad employers--to reduce their contribution somewhat. That is what this is all about. And because of an anachronism, we are forced to go through this procedure of waiving the budget law and the extraordinary procedure yesterday of directing the spending. This is a good measure. When we think it through and we look at the numbers and the requirement for the railroad companies, the employers, to increase their contribution, if the tier 2 fund does run out of money, this is a measure that is responsible. I want to say to those who brought it to the floor, on behalf of the hundreds of thousands of railroad employees and pensioners and survivors, thank you for taking this step for them and the companies for whom they work. I say to the chairman of the Finance Committee, thank you again for bringing the measure to the floor and for yielding this time to me today.

Mr. CARPER

Mr. CARPER. If the Senator will continue to yield, I have two glasses of water here. We will say one is the railroad pension fund as it currently exists, and it is full of U.S. Treasury obligations. There is another glass here and we will pretend it is empty for our purposes. What I think we are talking about doing is taking some of the moneys invested in these Treasury obligations in this one pension fund and, presumably, the railroad retirement fund would have to sell those obligations and then use the money from the sale of those obligations to put in their new pension fund. When they sell those, they are going to sell them to somebody--individuals, funds, banks, corporations. It is difficult for me to understand how that transaction I have just described should cost the Treasury $16 billion. A lot of us are struggling on this one.

Mr. CARPER. I thank the Senator.

Mr. CARPER. I, too, am a strong advocate of this legislation. I have spoken for it in the Chamber and in our caucus meetings as well. As the Senator from North Dakota and the Senator from New Mexico have indicated about their relatives, my grandfather was also on the railroad. My grandmother lived many years on a survivor's pension from his service. Whenever the chairman of the Budget Committee and the ranking member on the Budget Committee stand to endorse an amendment, it gives me pause. I want to make sure in the next several minutes-- maybe hours--that we consider this legislation I understand the full ramifications of the amendment or the failure to adopt the amendment. Let me ask the chairman of the Budget Committee this. When I first learned of the directed scorekeeping in the House of Representatives, which, as he said, is an extraordinary act, I tried to understand why they may have done that. Was it chicanery or was there real logic behind it? As I studied the issue more, my understanding is if we were not on a cash basis of accounting, but an accrual basis, this probably would not be an issue. Most States used to be on a cash basis of accounting. The majority of States now use the accrual basis, and most States direct the retirement funds into U.S. Treasury obligations. Today, it is a whole array of investments, including equities, or stocks, bonds, and the kinds of things envisioned here under this legislation. There are, as we know, tier 1 benefits under the railroad and tier 2. This is my question: The tier 1 benefits mirror Social Security benefits. Tier 2 are more private sector benefits. The moneys that go into those tier 2 funds for payout come from the railroad companies themselves--from the tax assessed on them--and also a payment by the railroad employees themselves. My understanding is that those monies that go into that retirement fund, paid into by the railroad companies and by the employees through the payroll deduction--those monies in the future will be invested not in U.S. Treasury obligations, but in a wide variety of investment options. But because of the peculiarity of our accounting rules, because those monies will now be not spent for roads or any other purpose, and not for space exploration, they will still be invested in the same pension benefits, but because of our accounting rules, those monies--simply by saying you can now invest those pension monies, the trust fund monies, in non-Treasury obligations triggers a $15 billion outlay. Is that what this is all about? I know that is a long question, but let me lay that question at the feet of our Budget Committee chairman.

Mr. CARPER. Will the Senator from North Dakota yield?

Mr. CARPER

Mr. CARPER. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent to address the Senate for 10 minutes.

Mr. CARPER. Mr. President, I had the privilege of presiding over the Senate during the last hour and listening to debate on two measures, including the measure the Senator from Nebraska has raised, the change in the railroad retirement system. We had considerable discussion on the economic stimulus package which has been debated in the Senate and passed in the House. I will take a few minutes and share a word about each of these. The Senator from Nebraska was a Governor and a former insurance commissioner of his State. In my previous life, I served as Governor of my State and also State treasurer. During that period of time we established the first cash management system for the State of Delaware. We had good, sound, progressive policymaking with respect to pension investments. We took a pension system that was not funded, a pay-as- you-go system, fully amortized it and strengthened the State's financial condition considerably. Basically, the State had money in accounts that did not earn much at all, the equivalent in some cases of Treasury rates, and we ended up developing a policy that enabled us to invest those moneys at market rates in things other than U.S. Treasurys or CDs of the bank. Part of what is proposed in this railroad retirement plan is: Take the money that has been set aside, paid into by the railroads themselves and by the railroad employees; that can only be invested in U.S. Treasury obligations. Let's give them the opportunity--not imprudently, but under the kinds of safeguards we have in Delaware, Nebraska, and South Dakota, as well, for State pension moneys--to invest those moneys on behalf of railroad employees, pensioners, and their survivors, in something other than U.S. Treasury obligations. If you look at the performance of mutual funds, the stock market, the corporate bond market, over time they will outperform Treasurys. Under that plan, given a prudent investment policy, we will be able to see a higher rate of return from those investments than currently realized in the investments under the current railroad retirement plan. We could have a good debate, and we ought to, about some other aspects of this bill--which I cosponsored and I very much want to see come to the floor for debate and discussion. Some of our colleagues have raised concerns about reducing the retirement age for those under the railroad retirement plan from 62 to 60. We could have a legitimate discussion over whether that reduction should be a graduated reduction to see if the money in the pension fund holds up. We could have a good discussion and debate about that. We ought to. We could have a good discussion about the issue of whether or not we ought to reduce all at once the payroll tax paid by the employers by the railroads. Maybe that is a reduction that should be phased in over a longer period of time. Again, this is a perfect issue to debate and seek middle ground. We should have a debate over whether or not the survivor benefits should go immediately to 100 percent of the benefit of the deceased railroad retiree or whether that, again, should be phased up over time. Railroad retirement is not Social Security. It is not the same as Social Security. I don't believe it was ever intended to be. Railroad retirement predates Social Security and has been around longer than Social Security. There are two aspects of railroad retirement, one called tier 1, which is comparable to Social Security. But another aspect is called tier 2, which provides, if you will, more of a private sector dimension. What we have in railroad retirement is a hybrid of Social Security and a private pension plan. People say we cannot make some of the changes that are envisioned here with the railroad pension plan because they are not consistent with what we are doing in Social Security. A lot of private retirement plans let people retire at age 60. A lot of private retirement plans allow employees to retire with benefits after 30 years of service. A lot of them provide that benefit at age 60 with 30 years of service, and that is what is being proposed here. We can, I guess, debate for some time whether or not this is the right time to bring this issue up. It is not a partisan issue. It has been suggested it is partisan and divisive. It is not a partisan issue. I believe 380 Members of the House voted for this bill earlier this year. There are 74 cosponsors to the measure in the Senate. The cosponsors come from both sides of the aisle. This is not a partisan issue. This is a bipartisan issue which seems to enjoy pretty good support in both Houses of the Congress, and also has the attractiveness, at least to me, that both rail labor and the railroads themselves support this bill. Enough on this measure. We are going to have a vote on cloture. We will have an opportunity to vote whether or not to move to the bill. I hope we do, and I hope when we do we will have an opportunity to actually discuss and debate some of the issues that our Republican friends have raised earlier this afternoon. I think we can find some middle ground that augurs well for those who are working in the railroad industry, those who are retired from the railroad industry and for their survivors, and one that is not unfair to the taxpayers of this country. Let me mention one other thing before I yield my time and that is on the economic stimulus package. This is a debate and an issue which cries out for a reasonable compromise. Several of the elements of a reasonable compromise have been suggested today. I want to go back to them, if I may. Senator Domenici, along with Senator Corzine and others, has come forward with I think a perfectly reasonable proposal on a payroll tax holiday whereby for 1 month neither employers nor employees would pay the Social Security payroll tax. The employees would keep that money in their paychecks. It would help people who are poor and also people who are not poor, but it would disproportionately help people at the lower end of the income spectrum. In addition, the employers would not pay their share of the payroll tax. It would help those businesses that are small and those that are not so small. I think disproportionately it might help those that are small more than those that are large. That idea, the idea of a payroll tax holiday for 1 month, if it were offered in lieu of the proposal to provide additional payroll tax rebate checks, in lieu of an expedited reduction in the 27 percent rate, and in lieu of an expedited expansion of the 10-percent bracket--that idea could be a very good compromise to bring Republicans and Democrats together. The payroll tax holiday has the added virtue, frankly, of helping States. Like other employers, States pay payroll taxes for their State employees. If they had a 1-month holiday, it would help most States. My State is not hurting as badly as others. The unemployment rate is well below average, but we are hurting too, and my guess is so is South Dakota and others. A payroll tax holiday would also provide money in the pockets of people who are very likely to spend it, and we need some of that stimulus. Another of the elements I want to mention today to provide a bridge between Democrats and Republicans on economic stimulus deals with what is called bonus depreciation, accelerated depreciation for capital investments that are made over the next 1, 2, or 3 years. Several principles were outlined for us in an agreement adopted earlier this fall by Democratic and Republican leaders of the House and Senate Budget Committee. Among those principles that were agreed to are these: the economic stimulus package should have an immediate impact; it should not have a long-term adverse consequence for a balanced budget; and it should be temporary in nature. The leaders of the budget committees agreed that all measures in the stimulus package should sunset in one year, to the extent practicable. If we take those three criteria and look at this notion of accelerated depreciation in order to stimulate capital investment, I think a compromise lies between what the House has agreed to and what the Senate is contemplating. If you look at the history of the last 12 months or so in this country as our economy has wound down, one of the things that has happened is we have seen a drying up of capital investment. There is a proposal offered by our Republican friends that says let's provide a 30-percent writeoff, 30-percent bonus depreciation for investments made over a 3-year period for companies that make those kinds of investments. Senator Baucus, in his proposal, said we should provide a 10-percent depreciation bonus over a 12-month period of time. There is plenty of room to compromise between 10 percent and 30 percent, and I suggest 20 percent might be that compromise for accelerated depreciation, bonus depreciation if you would. As for the time period, we should stay true to the 1-year figure, as Senator Baucus has proposed and as the budget committee leadership suggested. The third measure I have to offer as a compromise between Democrats and Republicans deals with a proposal I heard from Senator Collins of Maine and Senator Lieberman of Connecticut that we adopted in the Congress before I got here, in 1993. It is a proposal to encourage investment in small cap companies, those whose capitalization is $50 million or less. Those who hold investments in these companies-- securities issued by those companies, issued for 5 years--the 1993 law promised a reduction by one-half in the capital gains tax. As it turns out, because of the alternative minimum tax that is in place, the practical effect of the incentive offered by the 1993 law is for the most part moot. There is just not much of an incentive anymore, especially when the capital gains rate is taken down to 20 percent. I offer this. Look at a proposal offered by Senator Collins, cosponsored by Senator Lieberman, to make the 1993 law work. That proposal says let's make the 1993 law work by taking away the effect of the alternative minimum tax for those who make investments in accordance with the 1993 law. Those are three potential compromises which I think might bring us a little closer together as we try to work out some compromises. I hope we can get to work on this Railroad Retirement Act and hammer something out on that as well. I yield my time.