Tom DeLay

Mr. DeLAY

Mr. DeLAY. If the gentleman would yield further, I just want to correct the gentleman. He is absolutely right, it is constitutional for a $1,000 contribution from individuals and $5,000 contributions limited to PACs to political candidates.

Mr. DeLAY. Mr. Chairman, would the gentleman define ``shaking down'' for me?

Mr. DeLAY. I yield to the gentleman from Connecticut.

Mr. DeLAY. Mr. Chairman, I compliment the gentleman for his approach in trying to protect freedom of speech at the same time trying to regulate campaigns. The gentleman was chairman of the State party in Arkansas. He takes a much more evenhanded approach than the Shays- Meehan approach, and I applaud him for opposing the Gephardt constitutional amendment. The difference between the gentleman and myself is the gentleman wants to use regulators and bureaucrats to regulate. I want the people to make the decision, my constituents to make the decision, not a Washington bureaucrat. But the gentleman from Mississippi would not yield to me. So I want the gentleman, since he was a State party, I was shocked to hear the gentleman from Mississippi say that the national parties, both Republican and Democrats, exercise undue influence on elected officials that represent their parties. That is shocking to me, that the gentleman would even think of such a thing. In fact I think in the gentleman's bill, he does not restrict campaign contributions or moneys going to State parties.

Mr. DeLAY. Mr. Chairman, the gentleman has talked about all my motives for bringing this to the floor and everything, except the substance of the amendment before us. Could the gentleman enlighten us, is he for or against the amendment that is before us?

Mr. DeLAY. Mr. Chairman, I appreciate the gentleman's assessment of history, but I remember a different history. I remember a history that they used that as a great argument, and many are using the same kinds of arguments for the gentleman's bill, have used that for a great argument. But the result, and we all know why they did it, the reason they wanted to ban PACs to begin with is to stop Republicans from raising money and limiting their ability to raise money through PACs. Then they did not like that, because we were pretty good at it. And so they figured, the majority, then the Democrats, figured out another way to keep challengers, Republican challengers from challenging the Democrat incumbents serving in the House, from raising more money than these incumbents could use in free postage called the franking privilege.

Mr. DeLAY. Mr. Chairman will the gentleman yield?

Mr. DeLAY. Mr. Chairman, will the gentlewoman yield?

Mr. DeLAY. Mr. Chairman, will the gentleman yield?

Mr. DeLAY. Is the gentleman from Massachusetts not a cosponsor of this amendment?

Mr. DeLAY. I have not asked for the gentleman to yield.

Mr. DeLAY. Mr. Chairman, I yield myself the balance of the time. Mr. Chairman, it is amazing to me no one wants to talk about this constitutional amendment. When the gentleman from Missouri (Mr. Gephardt), the Democratic leader said, and I quote, ``I intend to fight for and make the case for this amendment, because I believe the future of our democracy demands such a change,'' yet he refuses to come down and speak for an amendment that he and others, including the gentleman from Massachusetts, have beaten their chest about for months in order to cover up some of the campaign abuses by the Clinton administration and the Democrat National Committee. The gentleman from Massachusetts has asked many questions trying to confuse us about the difference between contributions and expenditures for candidates and contributions and expenditures for organizations and parties. The Supreme Court was very real and very straightforward on the two. They said Congress could possibly limit contributions and expenditures to candidates because there is a potential for corruption. Now, I do not know anybody in this House that is corrupted by the expenditures or contributions. On the other hand, they also said parties and groups cannot be corrupted, therefore we cannot limit their ability to speak out by raising money and spending it. So I answer the gentleman from Massachusetts (Mr. Frank) in his own words, a letter to our colleagues signed by the gentleman from Massachusetts and the gentleman from Missouri (Mr. Gephardt): ``Many of the changes to our campaign finance system that people rationally argue for are simply unconstitutional.'' We heard him say right here that that is not the case. ``Since the Supreme Court's 1976 opinion in Buckley versus Valeo, through its recent decision in Colorado Republican Federal Campaign Committee, it has been made repeatedly clear that the constitutional barriers erected by the court cannot be wished away. That is, the Supreme Court has consistently and ever more assuredly told us that any restrictions on expenditures by candidates or anyone else are unconstitutional.'' This is the gentleman from Massachusetts. ``While we may restrict contributions to candidates, those permissible restrictions are very narrow and cannot reach the kind of abuses that we are interested in curbing because they are easily circumvented. In short, neither Congress nor the States have any constitutional authority to limit expenditures, independent issue advocacy, or uncoordinated.'' And I quote from the gentleman from Missouri and the gentleman from Massachusetts: ``The current explosion in third-party spending is simply beyond our ability to legislate.'' They want this constitutional amendment so that they can change the first amendment to the Constitution and limit our ability of free speech. And the reason I brought the amendment here is to catch them, to catch them after they had beaten their chests about Shays-Meehan and others. We will get into this and it will be a long, open and fair debate; what the reformers have asked us to do. And we will have that open and fair debate as long as it takes, because I believe that people in this body are too cavalier with American's freedoms. Too cavalier to say, as it was just said, we ought to stop these bad old special interests. Well, whose special interests? Americans that spend $100 or $200 to contribute to a group like National Right to Life or National Organization of Women? Are those big bad special interests? Mr. Chairman, I will be asking those that vote ``present'' on this amendment why they cannot stand up for what they have believed in in the past.

Mr. DeLAY. Mr. Chairman, the gentleman from Connecticut was talking about how great it was in 1974 that we had all this campaign reform. The gentleman ought to look at his history: 1974 is after Watergate. We had a huge infusion of Democrats elected after the Watergate election. The reason that most of the laws that were passed in 1974, I tell the gentleman, was to make sure that challengers could not raise as much money as the incumbents were spending on their franking privileges. My point is, my point is that what this debate is becoming is who wins and who loses. Who are we going to say gets to raise money and who does not? Why are we doing that? Most Members on my side of the aisle are here because they want to limit government. They want to get government out of our lives. They hate regulation. They want to reform the regulatory process of this government. And yet they turn right around and, in a most fundamental freedom of this country, the freedom to speech, they want to use regulation of campaigns to limit the American people's right to participate in campaigns openly and honestly. I think full disclosure does that. I do not think limiting people's freedom of speech by more bureaucracy, more laws, more opportunities to get one another, more opportunities to stop one group from being able to raise enough money for the other group, let the people decide. They are incredible when you allow the people the freedom to look at these elections, participate in them and openly and freely decide who they want to represent them.

Mr. DeLAY. Mr. Chairman, I appreciate the gentleman yielding, and I noted the gentlewoman from Michigan takes a shot at the gentleman from Texas but does not want to stand her ground. She claimed that she submitted to all the legal scholars of the State of Michigan and not one legal scholar that she knows of claims our position to be the right position. I just ask the question, has the gentlewoman from Michigan (Ms. Rivers) talked to the ACLU, a group that the gentlewoman would probably like their kind of support? She made inconsistent statements, inconsistent statements that no one believes in our position.

Mr. DeLAY. Mr. Chairman, if the gentleman would continue to yield to me, I think it is ironic that the gentlewoman, who had over 5 minutes now, wants us to yield to her after taking shots at the gentleman. So I just say there are no inconsistencies from this gentleman, particularly in light of the fact that the gentlewoman from Michigan raised the fact that the first amendment that I supported on religious liberty is an assault on the first amendment. As my colleagues know, the gentlewoman and--well, I retract that. The party, the Democrat party, has for so long tread on the freedoms of Americans that they cannot even understand, understand that when we are trying to pass a constitutional amendment to enhance the first amendment and enhance freedom, and here we are trying to defeat an amendment brought by the gentlewoman's own minority leader that is trying to destroy the first amendment, there are two very clear, consistent approaches to amendments to the Constitution. (On request of Mr. DeLay, and by unanimous consent, Mr. Peterson of Pennsylvania was allowed to proceed for 3 additional minutes.)

Mr. DeLAY. Mr. Chairman, will the gentleman yield to answer the gentleman?

Mr. DeLAY. Mr. Chairman, I have no idea.

Mr. DeLAY. Mr. Chairman, will the gentlewoman yield?

Mr. DeLAY. Mr. Chairman, I move to strike the last word. Mr. Chairman, I think we have had a pretty good start on a debate tonight. I wish some on the other side really wanted to debate this rather than just take cheap shots at people, because I think this is a very, very serious debate. We are talking about the most fundamental of freedoms that the American people have when we talk about limiting someone's right to speech and freedom of the press. Let me try to put it in perspective. I think we are drawing to a close. But just let me try to put in perspective what I saw here tonight. Where are we today? We found that in the campaigns of 1996, the Clinton administration, some unions, we are investigating the Teamsters right now, others may have violated the law in the ways that they collected campaign contributions, even from foreigners. To cover that up, the President's party and the leadership of his party in the House and the Senate decided that their biggest issue this Congress was going to be campaign reform and that they were serious about it. In fact, the gentleman from Missouri (Mr. Gephardt) the minority leader, wrote a constitutional amendment splitting the first amendment, splitting away free speech so that he could control through government bureaucracies and Washington bureaucracies freedom of people's right to free speech through the campaign process. I thought it was important and serious to bring the gentleman's constitutional amendment to the floor for serious scrutiny because the gentleman and the Democrat party of this House have been beating their chests for 2 years talking about campaign reform. They were serious, they said. They want an open and fair debate. They wanted to bring it down here and show the abuses and the corruptions of this House. Mr. Chairman, I am here to tell my colleagues I know most of the Members of this House, Democrat and Republican, and I do not know of one of them that is corrupt. Not one. And I am going to warn the Members of this House, when anyone talks about corruption, I am going to ask the question throughout this debate for that person to name the Member of the House that is corrupt. If they claim corruption and campaigns are corrupt, then they should be able to stand here in this House and have the courage to name the person that they feel is corrupted by campaign contributions. That is serious. I think it is very serious when some are so arrogant to come to this floor and propose legislation that says that they know better than my constituents about my fund-raising habits, my ability to raise campaigns. Now, the gentleman who brought the amendment, the gentleman from Missouri (Mr. Gephardt), came to the floor of the House, raises more money than me. So anybody that starts attacking me about raising money, I hope that they will look at the gentleman from Missouri. In the last election he raised $3.2 million and spent $3 million. I salute him. I think that is wonderful that he has been able to raise that kind of money. No telling how much expenditures, independent expenditures were spent on his behalf. Most people think that the unions spent in the 1996 election $35 million. That was what they assessed their members to spend extra. We have estimated and we continue to estimate that the unions alone have spent over $350 million in independent expenditures across this Nation. So be it. They have every right to do so. They should be able to express themselves as to who should control this body and who should be elected and who should be unelected. Most of the Members that have stood up here and complained about this process are the beneficiaries of that money, and yet they have the audacity to come down to the floor of the House and claim that the monies spent in their behalf by independent expenditures are corrupting. I have more confidence in my character than obviously they do, because I do not feel corrupted by participating in the process. We do not spend enough money in the process. We spend less than $5 a person that votes in this country to try to convince them to be part of this political process and participate in the process, less than $5 per person. That is amazing to me. Yet we call it corrupting to try to convince people to be part of the process and participate in the process.

Mr. DeLAY. Mr. Chairman, I appreciate the gentlewoman yielding, and I, too, send my sympathy to the Byrd family in Jasper, Texas. But the gentlewoman is calling frivolous her own minority leader's constitutional amendment, and she quotes the Speaker of the House on too much money. If the gentlewoman would hold it up again, I would like to read the quote again. I guess the gentlewoman is not going to. The gentlewoman says the Speaker says there is not enough money in politics. I would just ask the gentlewoman, what is enough money? Is the gentlewoman aware we spent in the Presidential and all elections last time, in 1996, $2.8 billion? That is less than the American people spend on potato chips. That is 1 percent of all the advertising in the country for products. And we are talking about the foundation of our democracy, our electorial politics. We spend 1 percent of all the advertising trying to convince the American people that you ought to be elected or I ought to be elected. What is too much? It is your time, and I just ask the question: How much is too much?

Mr. DeLAY. I think it is just outrageous that the gentleman would accuse leaders of both sides of the aisle of being able to raise money to participate in the campaign and call that a shakedown. It is not a shakedown to get out and actively participate in the process and ask people to participate in the process, whether it to be ask them for $1 or $100,000. It is an outrage that someone would come down to the floor and offer a constitutional amendment or write one or offer a piece of legislation that would stymie the freedom of the American people to decide to participate in the process and participate in free speech and free press. I think that is the outrage. That is the shakedown. That is the coverup. That is the thing that the American people ought to be outraged over. That is the thing we are going to stop because we are going to have this debate, and the American people are going to understand both sides.

Mr. DeLAY. Mr. Chairman, I am glad the gentleman is now ready to debate through this gentleman's time, because he would not take his own time to yield to me, but I just ask the gentleman once again, the gentleman, before the September that he is talking about, received benefits of over $500,000 from AFL-CIO, spent on him or against his opponent all the way through to September 15. There was more money spent past then, some claim to be almost over $1 million, spent by the labor unions, attacking his opponent. Then the gentleman admits to a huge amount of money being spent in the last 3 weeks on his behalf, independent expenditures. Yet I am just asking the gentleman, does the gentleman approve of that kind of expenditure, or does he not? Obviously he does not, because he now wants to support Shays-Meehan and Allen-Hutchinson, that would limit the ability of outside groups to spend that kind of money.

Mr. DeLAY. Mr. Chairman, will the gentleman yield?

Mr. DeLAY. Mr. Chairman, I do not understand how the so-called reformers do not want to debate the issue. They make incredible statements on the floor of the House, then yield back and do not want to debate. They claim that this leadership of this House does not keep their word in offering open and fair debate. We are going to have the most open and fair debate on this issue that my colleagues can imagine. Yet they do not want to debate because they do not want to look at the issues of free speech versus regulated speech, free speech versus stopping Americans from exercising their constitutional right. I was just going to ask the gentleman from Maine about the fact, and I have an USA Today article here dated Monday, September 30, 1996, and I do not blame the gentleman, I congratulate him; he got elected. But in this article it says the AFL-CIO has spent more than $500,000 on a series of television ads criticizing Longley, the gentleman's opponent in the last election, votes on Medicare, student loans and private pensions. The ads have helped make Portland the political advertising capital of the Nation. The gentleman from Maine (Mr. Allen) was the total beneficiary of this $500,000, yet he has the audacity to stand up on this floor and talk about the corruption created by big money expenditures especially when they have been made on his behalf.

Mr. DeLAY. Mr. Chairman, will the gentleman yield?