John Edwards

Mr. EDWARDS

Mr. EDWARDS. Mr. President, I rise today to draw attention to a dire situation in my state. North Carolina is in the midst of a severe drought, and there is no significant rainfall in sight. North Carolinians are used to hot, dry summers. But the dry spell has lingered and transformed itself into one of the worst droughts in the state's history. The entire State is under drought condition and most areas are experiencing ``extreme drought.'' A significant portion of the Piedmont is experiencing an ``exceptional drought,'' according to the U.S. Geological Survey. In fact, the Piedmont is short almost a full year's worth of rain and the city of Greensboro has a little more than 100 days supply of water. The damage estimates are already staggering. This drought has put many of our farmers on the edge of financial ruin. At a time of the year when you can drive down any rural North Carolina road and see lush, green crops ready for harvest, farmers are struggling to find enough water to save what hasn't already withered in the blazing sun. Farmers in more than half of North Carolina's 100 counties have already experienced more than 35 percent crop loss and it is still early in our growing season. But it is not just North Carolina's farmers that are suffering. Small businesses are particularly impacted by the mandatory water restrictions. Believe it or not, drought is not a recognized disaster under the Small Business Administration's Disaster Assistance Program. Of course, we can't make it rain. We can't cool the weather and slow the evaporation of our lakes and streams. But there are things we can do to help those impacted by this disaster. There are steps we should take immediately. I have asked Secretary Ann Veneman to certify our counties as disaster so our farmers can get the crop loss assistance it is clear they will so desperately need. I urge the administration to quickly act to help my farmers. President Bush is scheduled to travel to Greensboro, one of the most parched areas of North Carolina next week. I hope by then his administration will have recognized the dire conditions and approved my State's request for help. In the meantime, I am proud to cosponsor the Small Business Drought Relief Act, S. 2734. This is a straightforward measure that will bring important relief to thousands of small business owners by expanding the Small Business Administration's definition of disaster to include droughts. Another measure that I am supporting is the National Drought Preparedness Act of 2002, S. 2528. This measure creates a Federal drought preparedness and response policy, one that is so obviously needed. We in North Carolina know all too well the expertise and assistance the Federal Emergency Management Agency provides following a hurricane or tornado. We need that same clear, concise policy for droughts. But these measures can't help with the impact this drought is having on my State right this moment. North Carolinians are doing their part. Under the leadership of Governor Easley, cities and towns are advancing reasonable water-use restrictions. Residents are conserving, and we are all hoping and praying for a good rain. We need the administration to act quickly on the state's disaster requests. We need to get these residents the help they need.

Mr. EDWARDS

Mr. EDWARDS. Mr. President, 2 weeks ago as America celebrated the birth of our Nation, one of its greatest military leaders passed away. General Benjamin O. Davis Jr., 89, the legendary commander of the Tuskegee Airmen, died at Army Reed Medical Center on the Fourth of July. Yesterday, General Davis was laid to rest in Arlington National Cemetery. From his youth Davis knew that he wanted to become a pilot and serve his country. In 1932 he entered the U.S. Military Academy at West Point. Throughout his years at West Point he was shunned by his fellow cadets who refused to speak with him. Think of it, 4 years at one of the Nation's best institutions of higher education where no one spoke to you and you ate all of your meals alone. Davis once spoke of the intimidation and harassment he endured at the academy, saying, ``I wasn't leaving, this is something I wanted to do and I wasn't going to let anybody drive me out.'' In 1936, Davis became the first African American in the 20th century to graduate from West Point. After graduation Davis applied for the Army Air Corps but was rejected because of his race. He became professor of military science at the Tuskegee Institute in Alabama. In 1940, President Roosevelt issued an order allowing African Americans to fly for the military, and Davis immediately began his training at the Tuskegee Army Air Base. In 1942 he took command of the first all-black air unit, the 99th fighter squadron. Due to his excellent service in North Africa and Italy during World War II, he was promoted to colonel of the 322nd fighter group. As a colonel, Davis led 200 air combat missions. Davis would tell his men, ``We are not out looking for glory. We're out to do our mission.'' During his first mission, his 38 pilots held off over 100 German fighters. Davis's fighter group boasted an inspiring 100-percent success rate. None of the bombers he protected was ever lost to enemy fire. Despite his success, he was not allowed to command white troops and was turned away from segregated officers' clubs. After World War II, Davis led a fighter wing in the Korean War and, in 1953, was promoted to brigadier general, becoming the first black general in the Air Force. Over the next 13 years he would rise in rank to lieutenant general and serve as deputy-commander-in-chief of U.S. Strike Command. When Davis retired from the Air Force in 1970, he was the highest-ranking African American officer in the military. After hanging up his uniform Davis continued serving our country. He supervised the Federal Air Marshal Program and, in 1971, was named Assistant Secretary of Transportation. In 1998 President Clinton awarded Davis his fourth star. ``One person can bring about extraordinary change'' President Clinton said when speaking of the general. At the White House ceremony then-Defense Secretary William S. Cohen stated that ``General Davis is often held up as a shining example of what is possible for African Americans. But today we honor him not only as a great African American. We honor him because like his father before him, he is a great warrior, a great officer, and a great American.'' Indeed like his father, General Benjamin Oliver Davis Sr., he served his country with great patriotism in the face of discrimination. His father was the first African- American general in the U.S. Armed Forces. Even in his 80s, General Benjamin Oliver Davis Jr. still spoke with the strong, dignified and commanding manner he was known for during his professional career. Steve Crump, an Emmy-Award-winning journalist in Charlotte, NC who did a documentary on the Tuskegee Airmen, recalled a speech by General Davis to many of his fellow airmen. Crump said that the general's attendance was a surprise to the audience and that upon seeing him walk out on to the stage, they snapped to attention just as they had done more than 50 years earlier. At Seymour Johnson Air Force Base in Goldsboro, NC there is a KC-135 tanker with a portrait of Davis on its nose. The aircraft is dedicated to all the Tuskegee Airmen. One of the greatest of the greatest generation is gone. As those who passed on before him did, General Benjamin O. Davis, Jr. left us with a simple template on how to conduct ourselves in service to our country. Be of great courage, character and humility.

Mr. EDWARDS

Mr. EDWARDS. Madam President, this is a very simple proposition. Our friends on the other side of the aisle who oppose this prescription drug benefit largely oppose it because they say it is too expensive; we can't pay for it. They propose a prescription drug benefit that leaves lots of senior citizens behind. The problem is, when we respond with, No. 1, a more comprehensive prescription drug benefit that, in fact, protects all senior citizens and, No. 2, with a real and meaningful proposal to bring the cost of prescription drugs under control so that we can, in fact, afford a comprehensive prescription drug benefit for all senior citizens, that will work for all senior citizens, then they also block us on that front. This makes no sense. There is no logic to this. What we are saying is we want to provide a real and meaningful prescription drug benefit, No. 1; No. 2, in order to afford it, we have to do something about the cost of prescription drugs. The costs of prescription drugs have been going up anywhere from 10 to 20 percent a year, way above the cost of inflation. We have to do something about that. One of the issues Senator Schumer and Senator McCain have worked very hard on is legislation to close the loopholes in the patent system that allow brand companies to keep a patent on a drug when the generic ought to be able to enter the marketplace. We know the way this works. The brand name company has a patent. As soon as the generic is allowed to enter the marketplace, the cost of the medicine goes down so that not only senior citizens but all Americans are able to afford it. What we are doing and what they did in that legislation was to close loopholes that allowed brand name companies to keep generics out of the marketplace automatically for 30 months, if, in fact, a generic tried to enter the market at the time that a patent was about to expire. What we have done is worked to close those loopholes so we get generics into the marketplace, so we have real competition and, most importantly, so we lower the cost of prescription drugs for all Americans and so we have a prescription drug benefit that we can, in fact, afford. Senators McCain and Schumer actually had a very good bill. It dealt with the abuses that were occurring, situations such as a brand name company had a patent that was about to expire. They would come in and say: We are entitled to a new patent because our pills have to be in brown bottles; or we are entitled to a new patent because our pills have two lines on them, as opposed to one, for scoring when you have to cut the pills--no innovation, no creativity, no new medical benefit. This is not the reason the patent system was created. It is not the reason the original legislation, the Hatch-Waxman legislation, back in 1984, was created. What has happened is, the brand name companies have found a way to game the system, to exploit the system. The problem is, the people who pay the price of that are not the generic companies. The people who pay the price are Americans who have to go buy their medicine at the drugstore because when the generic can't get in the market, their cost stays up. And the only people who benefit are the brand companies that keep their patent, and their profit, as a result, stays much higher. What we have done, Senators McCain and Schumer have done, was help close the loopholes. When that legislation came before our committee, the Labor Committee, the HELP Committee, we worked, Senator Collins and I, in a bipartisan way, along with a number of our colleagues on both sides of the aisle, to address some of the concerns that others had about the McCain-Schumer bill. I actually think their bill was a very good bill and the work they did was very good. We dealt with it in a responsible way, found a bipartisan compromise. That is the legislation that is now on the floor of the Senate. It got the vote of five Republicans in committee. It is the kind of legislation that could actually do something about the cost of prescription drugs so we can afford a real and meaningful prescription drug benefit for all senior citizens in America.

Mr. EDWARDS

Mr. EDWARDS. The Senator is correct. There is a large group of distinguished securities lawyers and legal ethics lawyers who have written the SEC suggesting exactly what the Senator said--that it become part of the regulations and part of the law.

Mr. EDWARDS. That is correct.

Mr. EDWARDS. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the pending amendment be laid aside.

Mr. EDWARDS. Mr. President, I wish to say a few words about an amendment I intend to offer along with Senators Enzi and Corzine. This amendment addresses an important player in the problem we have had with corporate misconduct in this country. It is a player with which I have a lot of personal experience. That player is a lawyer. As most people know, I practiced law for 20 years and spent a lot of time representing kids and families against very powerful interests. I think I have a reasonably good understanding of what responsibilities we as lawyers have to the people we represent. While those are the kinds of folks that I mostly represented, other lawyers have different kinds of clients. Some lawyers represent corporations rather than individuals. The lawyers who represent corporations have the same kind of responsibility, but it is to a different entity and a different group of people. They have a responsibility, though, to represent that corporation, their client, zealously, the same way I had the responsibility to represent kids and families. One of the problems we have seen occurring with this sort of crisis in corporate misconduct is that some lawyers have forgotten their responsibility. We have heard a great deal about managers and accountants, which Senator Enzi is familiar with, and scandals such as Enron and WorldCom. Managers and accountants are the focus of Senator Sarbanes' bill, and they are critical to us doing what needs to be done to correct this problem and restore the public confidence. The truth is that executives and accountants do not work alone. Anybody who works in corporate America knows that wherever you see corporate executives and accountants working, lawyers are virtually always there looking over their shoulder. If executives and/or accountants are breaking the law, you can be sure that part of the problem is that the lawyers who are there and involved are not doing their jobs. For the sake of investors and regular employees, ordinary shareholders, we have to make sure that not only the executives and the accountants do what they are responsible for doing, but also that the lawyers do what they are responsible for doing as members of the bar and as citizens of the country. Let me be a little more specific about what this amendment does and what the responsibility of a lawyer is and should be. If you are a lawyer for a corporation, your client is the corporation and you work for the corporation and you work for the shareholders, the investors in that corporation; that is to whom you owe your responsibility and loyalty. And you have a responsibility to zealously advocate for the shareholders and investors in that corporation. What we have seen some lawyers do, unfortunately, is different. We have seen corporate lawyers sometimes forget who their client is. What happens is their day-to-day conduct is with the CEO or the chief financial officer because those are the individuals responsible for hiring them. So as a result, that is with whom they have a relationship. When they go to lunch with their client, the corporation, they are usually going to lunch with the CEO or the chief financial officer. When they get phone calls, they are usually returning calls to the CEO or the chief financial officer. The problem is that the CEO and the chief financial officer are not the client. Their responsibility and the client they have to advocate for--and which they have an ethical responsibility to advocate for--is, in fact, the corporation, not the CEO or the chief financial officer. One of the most critical responsibilities that those lawyers have is, when they see something occurring or about to occur that violates the law, breaks the law, they must act as an advocate for the shareholders, for the company itself, for the investors. They are there and they can see what is happening. They know the law and their responsibility is to do something about it if they see the law being broken or about to be broken. This amendment is about making sure those lawyers, in addition to the accountants and executives in the company, don't violate the law and, in fact, more importantly, ensure that the law is being followed. For some time, the SEC actually tried to do that in the late 1970s and early 1980s. They brought legal actions to enforce this basic responsibility of lawyers--the responsibility to take steps to make sure corporate managers didn't break the law and harm shareholders in the process. If you find out that the managers are breaking the law, you must tell them to stop. If they won't stop, you go to the board of directors, which represents the shareholders, and tell them what is going on. If they won't act responsibly and in compliance with the law, then you go to the board and say something has to be done; there is a violation of the law occurring. It is basically going up the ladder, up the chain of command. For years, the SEC recognized the principle that lawyers had a legal responsibility to go up the ladder if they saw wrongdoing occurring. But then they stopped. One of the reasons they stopped is because there were a lot of protests coming from the organized bar. With Enron and WorldCom, and all the other corporate misconduct we have seen, it is again clear that corporate lawyers should not be left to regulate themselves no more than accountants should be left to regulate themselves. There has been a lot of debate, rhetoric, and discussion-- rightfully so--about the necessity about not ``letting the fox guard the chicken coop.'' The same is true with lawyers. This has become clear through various acts of misconduct. The lawyers have involvement and responsibility, and they also cannot be left to regulate themselves. In January, a bipartisan group of the top securities lawyers and legal ethics experts in the country wrote a letter to Harvey Pitt telling him it was time for the SEC to enforce the up-the-ladder principle, as in the past. Mr. Pitt's top lawyer said: We are not going to do anything. If Congress wants something done, Congress should act. Then I wrote a letter to Mr. Pitt in essence saying: We are ready to act here. Will you help us in crafting legislation and working out this problem? That was 3 weeks ago. As of now, I have not yet received a response. The time has come for Congress to act. This amendment acts in a very simple way. It basically instructs the SEC to start doing exactly what they were doing 20 years ago, to start enforcing this up-the-ladder principle. This is what the amendment says specifically: First, the SEC shall establish rules to protect investors from unprofessional conduct by lawyers, conduct that violates the legal standards of the profession. Second, the SEC shall make one rule in particular, and it is a simple rule with two parts. No. 1, a lawyer with evidence of a material violation of the law has to report that evidence either to the chief legal counsel or the chief executive officer of the company. No. 2, if the person to whom that lawyer reports doesn't respond appropriately by remedying the violation, by doing something that makes sure it is cured, that lawyer has an obligation to go to the audit committee or to the board. It is that simple. You report the violation. If the violation isn't addressed properly, then you go to the board. Three important details about this amendment address some of the concerns that I have heard voiced. First, the way we have drafted the bill, the duty to report applies only to evidence of a material violation of the law. That means no reporting is required for piddling violations or violations that don't amount to anything. The obligation to report is triggered only by violations that are material--violations that a reasonable investor would want to know about. So we have been very careful there. Second, when the evidence is reported within the company, we have not specified how a CEO or a general counsel should act to rectify the violation. That is because the truth is that the appropriate response to cure the problem will vary dramatically, depending on the circumstances. If the CEO can do a short investigation, for example, and figure out that no violation occurred, then the obligation stops there. But if there is a serious violation of the law, the appropriate response is clear: The CEO has to act promptly to remedy the violation. If he doesn't, the lawyer has to go to the board. It is that simple. One final point. Nothing in this bill gives anybody a right to file a private lawsuit against anybody. The only people who can enforce this amendment are the people at the SEC. They will enforce this amendment not on behalf of any private party, but in the name of the American people. This is about forcing the SEC to do its job and protect the American people. Mr. President, I call up amendment No. 4187 and ask for its immediate consideration.

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

Mr. EDWARDS. I yield the floor. Mr. GRAMM addressed the Chair.

Mr. EDWARDS. Mr. President, my response to the question is the only obligation that this amendment creates is the obligation to report to the client, which begins with the chief legal officer, and, if that is unsuccessful, then to the board of the corporation. There is no obligation to report anything outside the client--the corporation.

Mr. EDWARDS. The answer is yes. The only way to enforce this legal requirement is through an administrative process.

Mr. EDWARDS. The answer is yes. Years ago, the SEC had and enforced such a regulation, which they have not been doing for some time.

Mr. EDWARDS. Will the Senator from Texas yield, if he has the floor?

Mr. EDWARDS. Madam President, I have a modification to my amendment at the desk.

Mr. EDWARDS. I yield the floor.

Mr. EDWARDS

Mr. EDWARDS. Madam President, I rise today to join with my colleague and friend, Senator Mike DeWine, to announce the introduction of legislation that will meaningfully improve the lives and well-being of children with disabilities and other special needs, their parents, and the child care providers who care for them. In recent years our commitment to helping working families afford child care has grown significantly through discretionary and nondiscretionary allocations under the Child Care and Development Fund, CCDF, and the Temporary Assistance for Needy Families, TANF, program. From a total Federal outlay of $2.5 billion in 1997, spending on child care through CCDF and TANF grew to $6.5 billion in 2000. When added to state spending, total Federal and State investments in child care assistance reached $9.0 billion in 2000. This figure represents a historic commitment to affordable, high quality child care in America, and I applaud all of my colleagues, on both sides of the aisle, whose support made the current levels of child care assistance possible. But the past, as they say, is behind us, reauthorization for CCDF and TANF is looming. It is vitally important for us to understand what our federal and state investments have bought us as we undertake the difficult job of renewing this legislation. Sadly, despite our historic Federal investments in world-class child care, the services available for too many hard-working families are neither affordable nor of very high quality. Though 1.8 million children received assistance in 1999, the Department of Health and Human Services estimated that 14.75 million children were eligible. Let me repeat that, in 1999, a little under 13 million children were living in working families poor enough to qualify for assistance under CCDF but got no help because no funds were available. Put another way, only 12 percent of eligible children received assistance. And that 12 percent figure reflects 1999 data at the height of a historic economic expansion that is now long past. The numbers of eligible families have undoubtedly grown, our commitments have not. We need to put the full effect of what we're talking about in context. The average cost of child care in America exceeds $4,000 per year. That's often more than the cost of tuition at many of our state colleges. $4,000 per year. For the working families with kids who are eligible, whose family income falls somewhere under 85 percent of the state median income level, but who never receive assistance, how in the world do we expect them to cope? For most of my constituents, $4,000 is a lot of money. When I talk to parents in North Carolina about the challenges they face, I can assure you, affordable child care is an issue parents worry a lot about. Finally, what does ``affordable'' child care look like? By that, I mean the child care that working parents can actually afford. The data on child care quality is daunting--85 percent of child care in America is rated as poor to mediocre. I invite my colleagues to think about a single young child, someone under 5, say, who they know personally. Perhaps someone in their family. Would anyone in this body willingly permit a child to spend even one minute in a care setting described as ``poor to mediocre''? Think about what that means for a healthy, growing infant or toddler. Young brains are developing, synaptic connections forming. The child's verbal and motor skills are actively expanding, growing, testing limits. Scientists tell us that there is a fairly direct and crucial relationship between the time and quality of interaction with adult caregivers and the healthy social and psychological development of a young child. Enriched early learning is not a luxury. A child who spends its critical early years in ``poor to mediocre'' care is like a runner who starts the race 20 yards behind the block. For the rest of his or her life, that child will be trying to catch up. And that's not fair. Now imagine if that same child had a disability. If he or she had cerebral palsy, or a sight impairment, or a learning disorder, or autism. A healthy child might be able to overcome a poor to mediocre start in life, but some of our most vulnerable children may not. As you might expect, it is more costly for child care providers to serve children with disabilities or other special needs. But often, states are under pressure to serve the record numbers of families who need child care assistance, and additional resources for children with disabilities or other special needs are not available. In many instances, providers simply are not able or willing to take on the unique challenges of caring for a disabled child. Children's advocates and parents of children with disabilities have reported significant shortages of affordable, high quality child care for children with disabilities and other special needs. These findings have been affirmed by the General Accounting Office, the Institute of Medicine, and the National Research Council. Low-income children are particularly at risk. Children in low-income families are more likely to be disabled than children in higher income families. Children who are poor are twice as likely to have a significant disability than their middle and upper income counterparts. A 2000 report based on interviews with California welfare recipients in 1992 and 1996 found that almost 20 percent of the families had at least one child who has a disability or illness. Low-income children also tend to live in poorer neighborhoods, compounding their lack of resources with the lack of readily available child care for special needs populations. As the GAO reported in 2001, ``low-income neighborhoods tend to have less overall child care supply as well as less supply for [special needs kids] than do higher-income neighborhoods.'' Finally, many child care providers require additional training and other resources necessary to deliver appropriate care, or to understand or comply with the Americans with Disabilities Act, ADA, or other applicable state or Federal standards. The Nurturing Special Kids Act of 2002 would: set aside additional CCDF funding, after the Quality Set-Aside is funded, to expand access to affordable, high-quality child care for children with disabilities or other special needs; support child care programs that accept children with disabilities or other special needs; provide higher reimbursement rates to child care providers that reflect the additional cost of specialized care in the State; fund consultations by providers with licensed professionals to improve identification of children with disabilities or other special needs, and strengthen providers' ability to care for children with disabilities or other special needs; provide a comprehensive system of training and technical assistance to enable child care providers to better care for children with disabilities or other special needs, including compliance with ADA and other regulatory requirements; provide grants for recruitment and retention of qualified staff; and provide grant funding for public agencies and private non- profits for projects that increase the availability of inclusive child care programs, up to 50 percent special needs kids. Most of us were elected to the Senate for one purpose: to stand for the vulnerable and for the defenseless when we make decisions that shape our society's future. To ensure that, whatever we do, we secure for all Americans, no matter their physical or mental disability or other impairment, the capacity to grow and succeed to the limits of their potential. I join with my friend, Senator DeWine, in introducing the Nurturing Special Kids Act of 2002, and I invite my colleagues to share this responsibility in support of affordable, high quality child care for children with disabilities or other special needs.

Mr. EDWARDS

Mr. EDWARDS. Madam President, I rise today to join with my colleague and friend, Senator Mike DeWine, to announce the introduction of legislation that will meaningfully improve the lives and well-being of children with disabilities and other special needs, their parents, and the child care providers who care for them. In recent years our commitment to helping working families afford child care has grown significantly through discretionary and nondiscretionary allocations under the Child Care and Development Fund, CCDF, and the Temporary Assistance for Needy Families, TANF, program. From a total Federal outlay of $2.5 billion in 1997, spending on child care through CCDF and TANF grew to $6.5 billion in 2000. When added to state spending, total Federal and State investments in child care assistance reached $9.0 billion in 2000. This figure represents a historic commitment to affordable, high quality child care in America, and I applaud all of my colleagues, on both sides of the aisle, whose support made the current levels of child care assistance possible. But the past, as they say, is behind us, reauthorization for CCDF and TANF is looming. It is vitally important for us to understand what our federal and state investments have bought us as we undertake the difficult job of renewing this legislation. Sadly, despite our historic Federal investments in world-class child care, the services available for too many hard-working families are neither affordable nor of very high quality. Though 1.8 million children received assistance in 1999, the Department of Health and Human Services estimated that 14.75 million children were eligible. Let me repeat that, in 1999, a little under 13 million children were living in working families poor enough to qualify for assistance under CCDF but got no help because no funds were available. Put another way, only 12 percent of eligible children received assistance. And that 12 percent figure reflects 1999 data at the height of a historic economic expansion that is now long past. The numbers of eligible families have undoubtedly grown, our commitments have not. We need to put the full effect of what we're talking about in context. The average cost of child care in America exceeds $4,000 per year. That's often more than the cost of tuition at many of our state colleges. $4,000 per year. For the working families with kids who are eligible, whose family income falls somewhere under 85 percent of the state median income level, but who never receive assistance, how in the world do we expect them to cope? For most of my constituents, $4,000 is a lot of money. When I talk to parents in North Carolina about the challenges they face, I can assure you, affordable child care is an issue parents worry a lot about. Finally, what does ``affordable'' child care look like? By that, I mean the child care that working parents can actually afford. The data on child care quality is daunting--85 percent of child care in America is rated as poor to mediocre. I invite my colleagues to think about a single young child, someone under 5, say, who they know personally. Perhaps someone in their family. Would anyone in this body willingly permit a child to spend even one minute in a care setting described as ``poor to mediocre''? Think about what that means for a healthy, growing infant or toddler. Young brains are developing, synaptic connections forming. The child's verbal and motor skills are actively expanding, growing, testing limits. Scientists tell us that there is a fairly direct and crucial relationship between the time and quality of interaction with adult caregivers and the healthy social and psychological development of a young child. Enriched early learning is not a luxury. A child who spends its critical early years in ``poor to mediocre'' care is like a runner who starts the race 20 yards behind the block. For the rest of his or her life, that child will be trying to catch up. And that's not fair. Now imagine if that same child had a disability. If he or she had cerebral palsy, or a sight impairment, or a learning disorder, or autism. A healthy child might be able to overcome a poor to mediocre start in life, but some of our most vulnerable children may not. As you might expect, it is more costly for child care providers to serve children with disabilities or other special needs. But often, states are under pressure to serve the record numbers of families who need child care assistance, and additional resources for children with disabilities or other special needs are not available. In many instances, providers simply are not able or willing to take on the unique challenges of caring for a disabled child. Children's advocates and parents of children with disabilities have reported significant shortages of affordable, high quality child care for children with disabilities and other special needs. These findings have been affirmed by the General Accounting Office, the Institute of Medicine, and the National Research Council. Low-income children are particularly at risk. Children in low-income families are more likely to be disabled than children in higher income families. Children who are poor are twice as likely to have a significant disability than their middle and upper income counterparts. A 2000 report based on interviews with California welfare recipients in 1992 and 1996 found that almost 20 percent of the families had at least one child who has a disability or illness. Low-income children also tend to live in poorer neighborhoods, compounding their lack of resources with the lack of readily available child care for special needs populations. As the GAO reported in 2001, ``low-income neighborhoods tend to have less overall child care supply as well as less supply for [special needs kids] than do higher-income neighborhoods.'' Finally, many child care providers require additional training and other resources necessary to deliver appropriate care, or to understand or comply with the Americans with Disabilities Act, ADA, or other applicable state or Federal standards. The Nurturing Special Kids Act of 2002 would: set aside additional CCDF funding, after the Quality Set-Aside is funded, to expand access to affordable, high-quality child care for children with disabilities or other special needs; support child care programs that accept children with disabilities or other special needs; provide higher reimbursement rates to child care providers that reflect the additional cost of specialized care in the State; fund consultations by providers with licensed professionals to improve identification of children with disabilities or other special needs, and strengthen providers' ability to care for children with disabilities or other special needs; provide a comprehensive system of training and technical assistance to enable child care providers to better care for children with disabilities or other special needs, including compliance with ADA and other regulatory requirements; provide grants for recruitment and retention of qualified staff; and provide grant funding for public agencies and private non- profits for projects that increase the availability of inclusive child care programs, up to 50 percent special needs kids. Most of us were elected to the Senate for one purpose: to stand for the vulnerable and for the defenseless when we make decisions that shape our society's future. To ensure that, whatever we do, we secure for all Americans, no matter their physical or mental disability or other impairment, the capacity to grow and succeed to the limits of their potential. I join with my friend, Senator DeWine, in introducing the Nurturing Special Kids Act of 2002, and I invite my colleagues to share this responsibility in support of affordable, high quality child care for children with disabilities or other special needs.

Mr. EDWARDS

Mr. EDWARDS. Mr. President, I thank Senators Levin and Warner for their leadership on this important bill. It is an important bill for the country and we need to move forward on it. It is important work they have done. I also thank my colleague from Washington, Senator Murray, for her leadership on this amendment. Women who serve our country in the military should have a right to use their own private money to pay for safe, legal medical care that they themselves choose. I wish to express my strong support for Senator Murray's amendment. We appreciate very much her leadership on this issue. I also want to take a minute to talk about the issue of homeland security. In the last couple of weeks, everybody in Washington has been talking about the administration's plan to reorganize a whole range of Government bureaucracies into a new Department of Homeland Security. Now Congress is rushing to complete this massive reshuffling in just a matter of weeks. I do not oppose this reorganization effort. In fact, I think it might do some real good in the long run. I applaud the very serious people on both sides of the aisle who are trying to make the plan the best it can possibly be. But I am troubled that Washington is becoming so caught up with reorganization that we are losing sight of our most urgent priorities. Everybody is asking who will report to whom? Who will be in what building? Who will get the corner office? We are beginning to convince ourselves that by reshuffling the bureaucracy, we are going to solve the real problem--that Government reorganization can win the war on terrorism. We cannot allow preoccupation with reorganization to distract us from the clear and present danger from terrorists who are in our midst as we speak. Our most urgent priority is simple: to find the terrorists, infiltrate their cells, and stop them, stop them cold. In order to do that, I think we need to address three critical questions directly related to prosecuting the war on terrorism today. No. 1, are we doing enough, everything in our power, to track al- Qaida, Hezbollah, Hamas, and every other terrorist organization within our own borders? To be more specific, are we doing enough to develop and deploy the human intelligence needed to infiltrate these organizations? No. 2, does the FBI know foreign intelligence information when they see it? And do they recognize all the uses of that information? For example, if the FBI acquires foreign intelligence information in the course of a criminal investigation, do they see the importance of that information, not just for their criminal prosecution but also in the ongoing effort to disrupt terrorists in their activities? No. 3, having recognized the importance of information, is the FBI effectively sharing that information, both within the FBI itself and with other elements of the intelligence community? No. 1, are we getting the information we need about the terrorists in this country? No. 2, are we recognizing all the uses of that information? No. 3, are we effectively sharing that information among those who need to have it in order to react to it? I believe the answer to all three of those questions is no. As a member of the Intelligence Committee, I believe these issues are fundamental to our ability to fight terrorism. They must be fixed now. And they do not require reorganization of existing bureaucracy. There is no question that we should reorganize the Government to meet the challenges of the future. But there is no substitute for the urgent steps we must take now, immediately, to meet the dangers of the present. I yield the floor.

Mr. EDWARDS

Mr. EDWARDS. Madam President, I want to say a few words about the responsibilities of lawyers in corporate America. In recent weeks we have learned about high-flying corporations that came crashing to the ground after top executives played fast and loose with the law. And we have heard how ordinary employees and shareholders can lose their life savings when millionaire managers break the rules. For the most part, the public has focused on the role of the managers and the accountants in allowing this kind of misconduct to happen, and of course that is critical. But the truth is that executives and accountants do not work alone. Wherever executives or accountants are at work in America today, lawyers are looking over their shoulders. And if the executives and accountants are breaking the law, you can be sure part of the problem is that the lawyers aren't doing their jobs. The findings of the jury in the Andersen case only highlight the role of lawyers in American business today. I know from personal experience what the responsibility of a lawyer is. I was proud to practice law for 20 years. I was proud to fight for my clients, regular people who had been wronged by powerful interests. When I took on a client, I recognized my duty to that client: to represent him or her zealously, but to do so within the limits of the law. The lawyers for a corporation--the lawyers at an Enron, for example-- they have different kinds of clients from the clients I had. But they have the same basic responsibility: to represent their clients zealously, and to represent them within the limits of the law. My concern today is that some corporate lawyers--not all, but some-- are forgetting that responsibility. Let me get a little more specific. If you are a lawyer for a corporation, your client is the corporation. You work for the corporation and for the ordinary shareholders who own the corporation. That is who you owe your loyalty to. That is who you owe your zealous advocacy to. What we see lawyers doing today is sometimes very different. Corporate lawyers sometimes forget they are working for the corporation and the shareholders who own it. Instead, they decide they are working for the chief executive officer or the chief operating officer who hired them. They get to thinking that playing squash with the CEO every week is more important than keeping faith with the shareholders every day. So the lawyers may not do their duty to say to their pal, the CEO, ``No, you cannot break the law.'' In my view, it is time to remind corporate lawyers of their legal and moral obligations--as members of the bar, as officers of the courts, as citizens of this country. The American Bar Association ought to take a leading role here, something they have not done thus far. The Securities and Exchange Commission has an essential part to play as well. For some time, the SEC promoted the basic responsibility of lawyers to take steps in order to stop corporate managers from breaking the law. The rule for lawyers that the SEC promoted was simple: If you find out managers are breaking the law, you tell them to stop. And if they won't stop, you go to the board of directors, the people who represent the shareholders, and you tell them what is going on. After promoting the simple principle that lawyers must ``go up the ladder'' when they learn about misconduct, the SEC gave up the fight. They gave up the fight in part because the American Bar Association opposed their efforts. In my view, it is time for the ABA and SEC to change their tune. Today I am sending a letter to the Chairman of the SEC, Harvey Pitt, asking him to renew the SEC's enforcement of corporate lawyers' ethical responsibility to go up the ladder. In answer to a petition from 40 leading legal scholars, the SEC has already signaled that it probably will not take up the challenge I am talking about. I believe that is wrong. If Mr. Pitt responds to my inquiry by saying that the SEC plans to do nothing, then I believe we will probably need to move in this body to impose the limited responsibility I have discussed. I ask unanimous consent that the full text of my letter to Mr. Pitt be printed in the Record.

Mr. EDWARDS

Mr. EDWARDS. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent the order for the quorum call be rescinded.

Mr. EDWARDS. Madam President, are we in morning business?

Mr. EDWARDS. I ask unanimous consent I be allowed to speak for up to 7 minutes as in morning business.

Mr. EDWARDS

Mr. EDWARDS. Mr. President, I also wish to say a few words about the estate tax debate we are having right now. With all due respect for my colleagues, I think this debate shows that a lot of people in Washington are totally out of touch with regular people back at home. I think we should step back and take stock of where we are right now. No. 1, as all of us know, we are in the middle of fighting a war against terrorism, and we do not know when that war will end. Our young men and women are in harm's way overseas as I speak. Here at home, we have very serious homeland security needs that the administration is struggling to meet. It is no exaggeration to say that Americans' lives depend on the success of those efforts. That is No. 1. No. 2: We have a whole raft of serious needs in our country. I have been talking about the rising crime rate, but that is just the beginning. We have seniors who cannot pay for the medicine they need to live. We have parents who cannot afford to send their kids to college. We have children who go to school every day in crowded classrooms with leaky roofs, even as this administration cuts funding for education. That list goes on and on. No. 3: We have a coming challenge in Social Security. We are going to have baby boomers retiring in huge numbers, and we are going to have to find a way to keep our social contract with them. No. 1, we have a costly war against terrorism to fight abroad and at home. No. 2, we have deep problems with crime and education and health care that we are not addressing. No. 3, we have a coming crisis in Social Security. And here is No. 4. Right now we cannot afford to address a lot of our serious needs--and in fact, our economy continues to sputter after a decade of extraordinary growth--because the country has gone from a multitrillion dollar surplus to a deficit in barely a year. That is very largely because of the tax cuts targeted to the wealthy this Congress already passed. It is a breathtaking fiscal turnaround. With terrorism, with crime and education and health care needs, with a Social Security crisis, with massive fiscal hemorrhaging, what are we talking about here today? We are not talking about reforming the estate tax to eliminate unfair burdens on farmers and small businesses, something I support. I very strongly believe that farmers and small businesses have to be protected from estate taxes. We are talking about whether to blow another massive hole in the budget to pay for a tax cut that mostly benefits about 3,000 of the wealthiest families each year. In a country of over 275 million people, many of them struggling to pay their mortgages and send their kids to college, we are talking about multimillion dollar windfalls for about three thousand fortunate families. I have only one question. Is this really why the American people send us here, to massively cut taxes on a very fortunate few while we are fighting terrorism and Social Security is in trouble and millions of middle class people are struggling? I do not think that is why people send us here. What my colleagues are trying to do today on the estate tax is wrong from a national security perspective. It is wrong from a Social Security perspective. It is wrong from an economic perspective. And most important of all, it is wrong from a moral perspective. Mr. President, I yield the floor.

Mr. EDWARDS

Mr. EDWARDS. Mr. President, I yield myself 17 minutes. Today I would like to speak for a few minutes about the fight against crime in America. We have made tremendous progress over the last 10 years, largely by putting more police officers on the street. But there are some troubling signs that the tide is turning against us. In 2000, the drop in the national crime rate was the smallest since 1991. And just yesterday, we learned that crime in North Carolina actually went up last year, for the first time since 1995. So now is not the time to rest on the laurels of our victories against crime. It is time to bring the fight to the stubbornest pockets of criminality and the toughest problems in the justice system. In my view, the number one problem in our criminal justice system today is the early release system--sometimes called probation, sometimes parole, sometimes intensive supervision. But whatever you call it, it doesn't work. It is overburdened, understaffed, inconsistent, and almost completely unsuccessful. There are about 4\1/2\ million people on probation and parole today, and most of them will break the law again and end up back in prison. According to a Justice Department study reported in the New York Times last week, two out of three inmates released from prison in 1994 were arrested again within 3 years. And that just counts the people who got caught. People on parole make up less than 1 percent of the American population, but they account for over 35 percent of the people entering prison each year. When criminals commit crime after crime after crime, we all suffer, and the poorest among us suffer the most. People leaving prison usually go back to the same tough neighborhoods they came from. In Winston- Salem, NC, 80 percent of the prisoners go back to 40 percent of the city. And when they return home to return to crime, it's the very last thing their struggling neighborhood needs. We need to put an end to this. And we can put an end to it--if we follow the example of successful efforts in states and communities across the country, including a new effort in Winston-Salem. I want to name three principles culled from these successful efforts. First, we must make it clear that parole is a simple bargain--obey the law or suffer the consequences. Second, we need a system that has the resources to monitor the enormous number of offenders and the methods to monitor them effectively. Finally, we need to give those offenders who are truly ready to become law-abiding citizens the chance to succeed. Let me explain each of these principles a little further. First and foremost, we need real punishments for people who commit real violations of probation and parole. Today we have the opposite. We have a system where at one extreme, people can violate probation or parole 10 times before anything actually happens to them. Nearly half the people in the probation system have violated the terms of probation, but only one in five gets sent back to jail for doing it. At the other extreme we have some people who miss an appointment and go back to jail for years. It just doesn't make sense. Let me give an example. We know that many people commit crimes to feed their drug habits. Almost half of the crimes in many big cities are committed by drug users. So if we are going to cut crime, we have to get people on probation and parole off of drugs. Now, it's true that right now, we say you have to remain drug-free while you're on probation or parole. But too often, that requirement only exists on paper. Drug tests are few and far between--maybe once a month and maybe less, so if a guy is using, he can hide it. If he does get caught, his parole officer has to negotiate with a bureaucracy to get the guy punished, so a lot of the time the officer doesn't bother. And if he does bother, the judge may choose not to impose the only punishment that's available, which may be years in jail. The result of all this is that drug users on probation or parole know they're not likely to get caught, and so they use again and again and again. As they return to addiction, they commit more crimes. We can do better. A rational probation and parole system would deter crime before it happens, using two basic elements. First, we would have strict supervision focused on the conduct that leads to crime. Instead of just rules against drug use, we would have frequent drug testing, like twice-a-week testing. Second--and this is critical--we would have automatic punishments for people who break the rules. Those punishments would be swift and certain and graduated. You test positive for drugs, you get punished. You test positive a second time, you get punished more severely. Automatic, no exceptions; simple, swift punishment. Here in the District of Columbia, the system is moving in this direction, and research shows that it is helping in the fight against crime. It is time for more places to do the same. By the way, the system ought to be the same for other violations of probation and parole besides drug abuse. Set real rules that focus on conduct connected with crime. If you break those rules, you suffer the consequences. That simple. No. 2: We need to get probation and parole officers out of their offices and on the streets. Right now, a lot of probation and parole officers sit in their offices and wait for trouble to come to them. A typical probation officer has two 15-minute meetings with each probationer every month. That is no way to keep tabs on anybody. What needs to happen in probation and parole today is not all that different from what needed to happen in police work 20 years ago. Twenty years ago, cops spent their time in squad cars responding to crimes. They caught some bad guys, but they did not stop crime before it happened. Some innovative police chiefs went back to the method of policing they had learned when they first came on the force. They moved police officers out of the cars and back onto the beat, where they got to know the neighborhood; got to know the shopkeepers, the pastors, the principals; got to learn from the many good folks in every community who the handful of troublemakers were. And this kind of police work, community policing supported by the COPS program, has helped to cut crime rates across America. It is time for the same revolution in probation and parole: Officers need to know the communities, not just the criminals. It has worked in Winston-Salem, where teams of probation and police, working with the clergy and the community, helped cut juvenile violence by 35 percent in the last year. That effort drew on a success in Boston where a team effort called Operation Nightlight helped cut youth homicides by 65 percent. Getting probation officers back on the streets will not be easy. For one thing, it will be impossible until we cut the massive burdens on these officers. The average probation officer had over five times as many cases in the late 1990s as in the early 1970s--sometimes 200 cases. Under these conditions, even the most dedicated public servant cannot get the job done. So we have to both change the bureaucratic culture and cut the caseloads in these departments. That may mean increasing the number of officers, it may mean holding managers more accountable, it may mean increasing competition for the work. But it is something we have to do. No. 3, We need to make sure offenders who are ready to turn their lives around have a real chance to do it. A convict's debt to society does not end with his prison term. Men who have left prison have a responsibility to obey the law, stay off drugs, and stop victimizing their community. They have another responsibility as well--a responsibility to become productive members of our society who work hard, pay taxes, and support their children. If they are willing to fulfill those responsibilities, we have to be willing to help them and keep an eye on them while they do. This is not about what society owes to prisoners, but we have to face the reality that we will never build enough prisons to keep people behind bars forever, and we would not want to be a society that did. Except for a tiny minority, they all come back to our communities. This is about what society owes vulnerable communities. The last thing they need is an influx of people who are addicted to drugs and do not have jobs and do not have supervision. Far too often, that is what our prisons are churning out today. We know that drug treatment helps prisoners get straight, but the share of prisoners receiving treatment dropped from 25 percent at the beginning of the 1990s to just 10 percent at the end. We know that prisoners who learn to read and write are less likely to commit new crimes, but we have cut prison literacy programs. We know that when somebody leaves jail, giving him a sweatsuit and sending him to the bus station in the dead of night is not the way to give him a fresh start. Too often, though, that is all we do when we release people from prison. We need to recognize that enabling prisoners to reintegrate into our communities as lawful and productive citizens is good for everybody. We should support proven efforts that get former prisoners to beat addictions and stay at work. And we should support the efforts of community leaders, especially religious leaders, to keep a stern eye on former offenders, while also lending them a helping hand. This is something that is beginning to work in Winston-Salem thanks to the Center for Community Safety at Winston-Salem State University. It is beginning to work in places like Maryland and Ohio. It is something that needs to work across America. That is the challenge: First, develop real and automatic punishments for real violations of probation and parole. Second, enable probation and parole officers to get out of their offices and onto the streets. Third, make sure offenders who are ready to turn their lives around have the chance to do it. Meeting that challenge will not be easy. Every State has different probation and parole systems. Some States have differences within their systems. While the truth is that a lot of these systems are not working, some of them are. Every reform I have described is already working someplace in America today. Our job in Washington will be to spread the things that work. I know there is legislation in conference right now that will help do that in a limited way. I believe we should think bigger, on the model of the COPS Program, a program that not only helped police departments hire over 100,000 more cops, but that also helped change the way police departments do business. We need the same kind of effort when it comes to transforming probation and parole into an effective, accountable system for reducing crime. It may be that this administration will oppose this effort. Their current budget has already proposed gutting the COPS Program. This administration seems to think that permanent tax cuts for the very wealthiest Americans are more important than cutting crime in the very poorest communities. I see it differently.

Mr. EDWARDS

Mr. EDWARDS. Mr. President, I thank Senators Baucus and Grassley for working with me on my amendments to this legislation. They and their staffs were very helpful. There was one amendment that I filed to this bill that I had intended to offer dealing with tax incentives to help communities affected by trade. I did not offer it because I know that the leaders of the bill as well as the leadership of the Senate all agreed that there would be no tax amendments to this bill. However, I would like to speak about the amendment very briefly, because I intend to look for future opportunities to see it passed. The amendment is designed to help communities devastated by foreign trade get back on their feet by providing incentives for businesses to locate in these areas. Already, the Federal Government has policies to help communities in trouble attract new business through tax incentives. The programs are called Empowerment Zones and Renewal Communities. Here is the problem: These designations do not help struggling rural communities that have been hit with dramatic job losses only recently. A decade ago, these communities were home to busy textile plants. Today, they are being devastated as their major employers shut down and thousands of jobs disappear. Many of the people in these communities have lived in these towns for generations. They should not have to move away just because the textile plant where they worked has closed down. Retraining will help. I am pleased that my amendment to help improve training programs was passed by the Senate last week, but that training is not going to matter if there are not new jobs to take the place of the ones they lost. We need to encourage investment in these trade- affected areas so workers do not have to pack up their families and move to the city just to get a new job. That is what my proposal is about. It is modeled after Empowerment Zones and Renewal Communities. We'd create new Economic Revitalization Zones for areas hard-hit by trade. Economic Revitalization Zones, or ERZs, would be areas that have experienced major job losses in a critical industries as a result of trade agreements or shifts in production. Communities would be eligible for designation as ERZs if they are in a trade-affected state and a significant portion of their employment base was dependent on an industry substantially affected by trade. Benefits in ERZs would be similar to those in Renewal Communities and Empowerment Zones. Here are five examples: One, a 20-percent wage credit for the first $15,000 of wages paid to a zone resident who works in the zone; Two, commercial revitalization tax incentives [write-offs for companies that revitalize abandoned or dormant industrial property]; Three, increased write-offs for capital investments; Four, authority to issue tax exempt bonds to promote business development; and Five, the New Market Tax Credit, which already provides incentives for businesses to invest. Economic revitalization zones would be a lifeline for communities that are suffering from the negative effects of trade agreements. We owe this to the hardworking families in these communities. As the industries they've relied on for decades are destroyed, the least we can do is to help them plan for the future. I believe this is an important proposal. I look forward to working with my colleagues who are on the Finance Committee to find other opportunities to advance this important initiative.