Lloyd Doggett

Mr. DOGGETT

Mr. DOGGETT. Madam Speaker, I demand a recorded vote.

Mr. DOGGETT. Madam Speaker, I move to reconsider the vote. Motion to Table Offered by Mr. Riggs

Mr. DOGGETT

Mr. DOGGETT. Mr. Speaker, I have a privileged motion at the desk.

Mr. DOGGETT. Mr. Speaker, on that, I demand the yeas and nays.

Mr. DOGGETT

Mr. DOGGETT. Mr. Speaker, the gentleman from California [Mr. Riggs] uses the term ``demeans.'' We feel it is this very bill that demeans public education, just as his vote to cut $137 million from Head Start demeans public education, just as his vote to eliminate the school lunch program demeans public education. You are going to give choice to those on school lunch, the choice to not have any lunch.

Mr. DOGGETT. Mr. Speaker, let me just say to the gentleman from South Carolina that we say this is declaring war on public education, that the first shot was fired when he voted to eliminate the school lunch program, that the second shot was fired when he voted to cut Head Start by 137 million, and now, when we take 10 cents on the dollar out of public education and give it to private education, that is another shot in the war against public education.

Mr. DOGGETT. Mr. Speaker, I am very pleased that Speaker Gingrich and his supporters have finally realized that the American people really do want the Federal Government to play a role, a vital role, in improving our schools. It was just a few months ago that the Republicans had a different approach. They had a big ax out here. They were ready to cut school lunch. They were ready to cut Head Start. They wanted to cut down the Department of Education and essentially terminate any Federal commitment to education. It was really only just a few weeks ago that they were right here on the floor of this House derisively referring to our public schools as government-owned schools. Today they come forward with their big solution. They want to offer choice. We are all for choice, and the choice that they want to offer public education when we read the fine print of this bill is the choice to do without, the choice to do without the moneys to get the job done to educate our children. It is a clever approach. They call it a help bill, but everyone who is familiar with the demands that are placed on our public schools recognize it is nothing but a hurt bill. It puts a big hurt on public education. The whole bill reminds me a little bit of the fellow who was trying to come to my hometown, Austin, TX. He got lost over in the piney woods. He walked up to a fellow at a service station over there and asked how to get down to the state capital. The old man scratched his head and said, ``I don't rightly know, but I sure wouldn't start from here.'' Mr. Speaker, we sure do not want to start from here siphoning off money from public education. Unlike some earlier attempts, this bill is mighty clear. It will take money away from public education and give it to private parochial schools. I guarantee Members that folks like Jerry Falwell who says, ``I hope to live to see the day when we won't have any public schools, what a happy day that will be,'' they have a stake in this because they are going to be the beneficiaries of robbing public education to help the few in private education. I am all for private education, even though I am a graduate, as are my children, of the great public school system in central Texas. But let the parents pay for that private education, and use public resources not to fund Mr. Falwell, but to help our children.

Mr. DOGGETT. Mr. Speaker, I respectfully say to the gentleman that he is passionate all right, but I believe he is passionately wrong, and when he comes to the floor and votes to cut the school lunch program, votes to cut Head Start by $137 million, and then comes back to the floor and says, today I am here to help, there is a little bit of a credibility problem.

Mr. DOGGETT

Mr. DOGGETT. Mr. Speaker, today Democrats are lining up for reform. We have had enough. We have had enough delay. We have had enough Republican excuses. We have had enough hiding behind investigations. We want a real, meaningful cleanup of the campaign finance system. Therefore, we are here lined up to sign a discharge petition to discharge all the proposals on campaign finance reform, some authored by Republicans, some authored by Democrats. Some I am for, some I am against, but we need a meaningful debate on this floor and only one thing has stopped that in this House, and that is the Speaker of the House, who refuses to bring it to the floor. Mr. Speaker, we say to the American people that we believe the only way to discharge our responsibilities as representatives seeking a cleanup of the corrupting special interests' influence peddling that goes on here in Washington is to put our names right here on a discharge petition forcing a debate so that reform can be effected by the next election. Mr. Speaker, if the Republicans are ready to join in that effort, it will be a reality. Investigate and prosecute any existing violations, but reform the law.

Mr. DOGGETT

Mr. DOGGETT. Madam Speaker, well, as we know in Texas, you do not help our public schools by siphoning off the money and giving it to private elite academies, and that is what this so-called Private School Expense Act that we are about to debate is all about. It is at the expense of public education that we help the private elite academies that serve a small percentage of the wealthiest among us. I think it is wrong. I represent communities in the capital of Texas, the central Texas area, that will next month receive more blue ribbon school awards for quality public education than any other area our size. Our business community supports our public schools through a massive adopt-a-school program of time and resources. But today's Private School Expense Act goes in just the opposite direction. If we want to support those efforts, those local community efforts for strong public schools, we do not take Federal resources and divert them and provide an incentive for the wealthy to leave public education. Let us unite behind public education and reject this private incentive program.

Mr. DOGGETT

Mr. DOGGETT. Madam Speaker, how much time is remaining? The SPEAKER pro tempore [Mrs. Emerson]. The gentleman from Texas [Mr. Doggett] has 4 minutes remaining.

Mr. DOGGETT. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself 10 seconds. The gentleman who claims to represent so many veterans, while at the same time opposing an amendment in their vital interest, should have his facts correct. There is no reason why veterans should not be able to access this money and the conference committee able to adjust the differences under this instruction. Mr. Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from Pennsylvania [Mr. McHale], a member of this body who serves on the Committee on National Security, who had the courage to resign his seat in the Pennsylvania House to serve our country in the gulf war, who is a marine and remains active not only as a veteran of that war, but as a colonel in the Marine Reserve.

Mr. DOGGETT. Mr. Speaker, I yield 1\1/2\ minutes to the gentleman from Texas [Mr. Reyes] a new Member of this body who has already distinguished himself as a member of the Committee on National Security and as a representative for the many men and women at Fort Bliss, TX, and the many veterans in the El Paso area.

Mr. DOGGETT. Mr. Speaker, how much time remains on each side?

Mr. DOGGETT. Mr. Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from Illinois [Mr. Evans]. I can think of no one better able to respond about the Committee on Veterans' Affairs than the ranking member.

Mr. DOGGETT. Mr. Speaker, I yield 1 minute to the gentleman from Texas [Mr. Turner], another distinguished member of the Committee on National Security, an advocate for veterans.

Mr. DOGGETT. Madam Speaker, I yield myself 25 seconds to say that I think this is the first time I have found a debate here maybe really persuades an opponent, who is still opposing a measure but says we should adopt it by unanimous consent. I would join the gentleman in urging Speaker Gingrich to set every measure the gentleman mentioned on this calendar. I do not understand why Medicare subvention has not been set out here. I do not understand why a mechanism for our gulf war veterans to make claims against Saddam Hussein has not been put on the calendar. I do not understand why this motion was tucked away at midnight last night and then adjourned instead of addressed. I think our veterans should be put first instead of last again and again by this Republican leadership. Madam Speaker, I yield 1 minute to the gentlewoman from New Haven, CT [Ms. DeLauro], who has been an articulate spokesperson not only on the needs of our veterans but on the tremendous dangers of nicotine addiction.

Mr. DOGGETT. Madam Speaker, I yield myself the balance of my time. Members, with this motion, we probe once more the influence of the powerful tobacco lobby on this Congress: The same tobacco companies that begin the addiction of 3,000 children in America every day to nicotine; the same tobacco companies that rank among the top soft money contributors to soften up the political leadership of this Congress; the same tobacco companies that give that soft money to produce a hard, bad deal for the ordinary working American; the same tobacco companies that snuck into this Congress earlier this summer and got themselves a $50 billion tax break, masquerading under the title ``Technical Amendments to the Small Business Job Protection Act,'' and then were so ashamed of it, they could not find anyone to claim authorship of that provision urged on by former Republican chair Haley Barbour. That same group seems to have no shame, because not having gotten enough in the past from this Congress with their audacity, they come forward today through the senior Senator from North Carolina, and they ask to have their claims put on top of the heroic men and women who fought our Nation's battles in the gulf war. The gentleman from Kentucky keeps referring to our clouding the issue this morning. Well, my colleagues, the only cloud here is a smoke cloud, a cloud of smoke that lingers over this Congress as long as the tobacco industry has a stranglehold on it. A vote for this motion is simply a vote to assure an opportunity, not a guarantee, an opportunity for our gulf war veterans to make their case before the commission and to have a decision rendered based on the evidence that they are entitled to some payment for the illness and the disability that they are suffering. As my colleague from Texas just pointed out, $1.2 billion is probably just pocket change to the seven largest tobacco companies that have been blocking, since Democrats were in control of this Congress, that have been blocking the access of our veterans to get to these funds. Let me emphasize, contrary to what we heard from the opposition, from the gentleman from Kentucky, that in no way does this motion interfere with the obligation of the Federal Government to meet the needs of our veterans. I am merely suggesting that a young veteran who suddenly finds himself without the capacity to provide for his or her family, cut down in his youth, ought not to have to rely solely on a Veterans Hospital and on veterans disability payments, which often are not adequate to meet the true needs of a family; and that that veteran ought to have the right to say Mr. Saddam Hussein violated international law, as the United Nations even concluded, in invading Kuwait, and I ought to be able to get back some of the loss that my family has suffered as a result of his violation of international law, and my claim is every bit as legitimate as the seven tobacco companies that sold the cigarettes that the Iraqi soldiers were smoking there in the desert, and may still be laying around the desert somewhere, when they dealt with Saddam Hussein before he started this war. It is my contention that these disabled veterans, as the VFW has concluded, as the State Department has concluded, will get nothing unless they have priority. The front page of the ``Stars and Stripes'' magazine tells it all: ``Our veterans await the decision of this Congress, even as Senator Helms speaks out today that he would bar every cent of their claim.'' I ask my colleagues to stand first with our gulf war veterans because they stood first for this country. We have a simple decision on this record vote. Stand with GI Joe, stand with GI Jane, who defended our democracy, not Joe Camel, who continues to exploit our children.

Mr. DOGGETT. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself 10 seconds. Mr. Speaker, the gentleman from Kentucky is referring to testimony given in 1994. This Congress made it clear that in no way would the right to claim against Saddam Hussein's assets interfere with the right of every veteran to the rights assured under the Veterans Administration, which were preserved. The Veterans of Foreign Wars took exactly the opposite direction. Mr. Speaker, I yield 1\1/2\ minutes to the gentleman from Massachusetts [Mr. Tierney], a Member of this body who has expressed significant concerns on behalf of our veterans, some 67,000 that he represents in Massachusetts.

Mr. DOGGETT. Mr. Speaker, I yield 1 minute and 30 seconds to the gentlewoman from Michigan [Ms. Stabenow], a woman in this body, because there are women who fought for this country in the gulf war as well, an outspoken advocate for veterans, especially those suffering from gulf war syndrome.

Mr. DOGGETT. Mr. Speaker, will the gentleman yield?

Mr. DOGGETT. Mr. Speaker, I appreciate the gentleman raising the question. As the gentleman well knows, to be more specific in this motion, which is not truly an amendment, it is the Helms amendment by Senator Helms of North Carolina that is the problem here. The House bill does not speak to this issue. The only motion I could offer, after consulting with the parliamentarian, was of the nature here. I would like to have spelled out the entire mechanism for veterans recovery, but I believe that if we instruct our conferees in this fashion, the conference committee will be authorized to continue its negotiations, as it is negotiating now, to give veterans first preference, I would prefer, or at least treat them equally to the tobacco companies. I think they have earned that. I believe that that is the effect of this motion. To not approve this motion, even under the statement of Senator Helms as reported in Stars and Stripes by his explanation, we are assuring that veterans will never recover one penny of Saddam Hussein's assets if the Helms amendment sticks. That is why all these veterans groups are coming out against the Helms amendment and speaking out so vigorously against it and in favor of the motion that I am offering.

Mr. DOGGETT. Madam Speaker, I move the previous question on the motion. The previous question was ordered.

Mr. DOGGETT. Madam Speaker, I yield 4 minutes to the gentleman from Texas, [Mr. Chet Edwards]. We are fortunate, indeed, to have in this body someone who represents more members of our military in a populated area than anyone else in the world, I believe, Fort Hood, TX, the former chair of the Veterans Health Subcommittee within the Committee on National Security, I believe, and now on the Committee on Appropriations.

Mr. DOGGETT

Mr. DOGGETT. Mr. Speaker, on that I demand the yeas and nays.