Barney Frank

Mr. FRANK of Massachusetts

Mr. FRANK of Massachusetts. Mr. Chairman, I will finish by saying the gentleman from California was gracious and said I had been fair and he talked about my not being partisan. I want to congratulate him for his lack of partisanship, because having served the majority of his time here under Republican administrations, he retains a deep distrust of the State Department, including the current State Department, and apparently his point is he cannot trust the current State Department to enforce democracy. I am inclined to appreciate his point. And while we have some differences, I did want to give him credit for his very bipartisan skepticism. Mr. Chairman, I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. FRANK of Massachusetts. I yield 3 minutes to the gentlewoman from Texas (Ms. Jackson-Lee). (Ms. JACKSON-LEE of Texas asked and was given permission to revise and extend her remarks.)

Mr. FRANK of Massachusetts. Mr. Chairman, I yield 1 additional minute.

Mr. FRANK of Massachusetts. Yes.

Mr. FRANK of Massachusetts. Mr. Chairman, I demand a recorded vote.

Mr. FRANK of Massachusetts. I now yield 3 minutes to another member of the Committee on Financial Services who has been a leader in our relationships with the multinational institutions, the gentlewoman from Wisconsin (Ms. Moore).

Mr. FRANK of Massachusetts. Mr. Chairman, I know I am taking the time in opposition. I am not so much in opposition, but I am about as close to it as anybody we are going to find here, so I think I qualify. I agree very much. On a case-by-case basis, I believe the gentleman from California and I would agree at each instance. And so I hope the amendment is adopted. I would make one point, as I thought about it. It does reinforce the point that we should not be imposing on the recipient government's policy choices that a democratic government ought to make. The flip side of a commitment to democracy is recognizing the validity of those decisions. I also agree with the gentleman. His wording is better than the wording I put in here for the future, permits free and fair elections, although there is always, when you are talking about the future, some weasel word. I will work with the gentleman going forward. I am going to suggest to him maybe later that we might empower them to do a moratorium for a short period of time on payments in the following situation. We have had cases where bad governments were overthrown by people who are democratic. East Timor is an example. There is Ghana, where Jerry Rawlings overthrew a government and then had an election. His party is now in the opposition. Uganda. The gentleman is right. Ordinarily it may not take that much time, but things could be so chaotic, like in Liberia, when the new government came in there with some bad people. Maybe a year would be too little. I will be talking to him later. I hope this amendment is adopted. Perhaps we could provide a temporary moratorium for a government that took over in those circumstances for perhaps 6 months or a year. But that's something we might work out. The gentleman seems to agree that that is something that, while no commitment is obviously made, that we could work on. I hope the amendment is adopted. Mr. Chairman, I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. FRANK of Massachusetts. Yes.

Mr. FRANK of Massachusetts. Would the gentleman yield?

Mr. FRANK of Massachusetts. So the gentleman is telling me that the Government of Iraq has no business interests in Iraq?

Mr. FRANK of Massachusetts. No. I'm asking the question, does the government--

Mr. FRANK of Massachusetts. No, I'm sorry. The gentleman does not seem to understand the rules. I'm giving you a lot more of my time. Well, I guess free speech that we put in is for other countries. Look, I understand the thought. The minority thought they came up with a clever idea and they outsmarted themselves. They put language in here that I think would interfere with the ability to have economic relations with Iraq. And apparently what I'm being told is if you believe that the Government of Iraq has no business interests with Iran, then you can vote for this bill and not worry about Iraq. I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. FRANK of Massachusetts. Madam Speaker, I demand a recorded vote.

Mr. FRANK of Massachusetts. Mr. Chairman, I offer that amendment.

Mr. FRANK of Massachusetts. Madam Speaker, I rise to claim the 5 minutes in opposition; although I'm open to persuasion.

Mr. FRANK of Massachusetts. Reclaiming my time, we only get 5 minutes. You know, if the minority had wanted to put this forward as an amendment, we could have debated it. They did it this way. So we can debate all of the other things. It's a very straightforward question. You limit eligibility under this program. Iraq might very well owe us money. The question isn't nuclear weapons. It is, would this prevent Iraq from being eligible, these criteria. And I would hope someone would answer that. I will yield again for an answer.

Mr. FRANK of Massachusetts. No, I'm sorry. Here's the response. The minority had the right to offer this in a way in which we could debate it. They didn't choose to do that. They chose to do it in this limited fashion. So it does look to me like you are having problems here that does the Government of Iraq have business interests with Iran. I know there are close ties between the Governments of Iraq and Iran. There's interchangeability. I think this is a pretty sketchy way to go forward. I'm not sure that there are any other countries. I think Iraq may be one of the few that doesn't. It's fairly narrowly drawn, but that's of great concern. And I couldn't get a direct answer, and I don't know if anybody really knows it.

Mr. FRANK of Massachusetts. Yes.

Mr. FRANK of Massachusetts. I know the gentleman joins me in looking forward to continued years of such treatment.

Mr. FRANK of Massachusetts. Mr. Chairman, the gentlewoman from Illinois (Mrs. Biggert) alluded earlier to this amendment. We reject the kind of conditions that try to set tax policy or education policy or resource policy within a country, because if you go with democracy, you allow the countries to make them. But we did have a right, we thought, to set some conditions that affect us. We set forth some conditions involving democracy and openness, in consultation with the minority. We were reminded of some other conditions. So this adds to the conditionality. If this amendment is adopted, there will be conditions requiring that people assuage terrorism, that they work with us on immigration, and that they avoid any participation in human smuggling. I believe that these are agreed on, and in fact in some cases were put forward at the request of the minority. In some cases we thought they were clear. But one of the things I learned when you are legislating is never object to redundancy. It is better to say it twice than to have some ambiguity about whether you offered it at all. So I offer this amendment I believe on behalf of the leadership and the membership of both sides of the committee. Mr. Chairman, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. FRANK of Massachusetts. Madam Speaker, pursuant to the instructions of the House in the motion to recommit, I report H.R. 2634 back to the House with an amendment.

Mr. FRANK of Massachusetts. I yield myself the remaining time. I join in thanking all those who participated. It may seem that this is an orgy of self-congratulations but it really is a celebration of an important point, namely that we are capable of disagreeing with each other strongly on very important public policy issues without that injuring our ability to cooperate in other areas where we can agree. The Committee on Financial Services has some very sharp divisions, for example, in the role of the Federal Government in helping to build affordable housing and the rules that should apply there on the restrictions that should apply. I am very proud that has not in any way hindered us from working together on these things which are both in the national interest and in the interests of humanity. Talking about the committee, I do want to mention one other person who has played a very important role here, no longer a Member, but the former chairman of the committee, the gentleman from Iowa, Mr. Leach. The initial effort to put through debt relief was over the objection of the leadership of the House and the administration, the Republican House leadership and the Clinton administration. They weren't opposed to it in principle, they were hesitant. A group of Members pushed it through, and among those was the then chairman of the Committee on Financial Services, Mr. Leach, and we are following in the footsteps of those actions. There are just a couple of points about this that I want to stress. We have some amendments. I will be agreeing to all the amendments. One or two may need some little work later on. But there is an important principle here. During the nineties in particular, we had a great deal of turmoil in the world because as the international institutions, the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund and the others, provided some financial assistance to low-income countries, they also provided some very intrusive prescriptions about public policy and decisions. If you are going to talk about democracy, Mr. Chairman, you have to honor it. You can't be for democracy only when you know you are going to agree with the outcome. For the international institutions, with the backing of the American government all too often, and other governments, to have used the need of these countries for assistance, financial assistance, as a lever to dictate what should have been left to the democratic process, was harmful theoretically and practically. It led to decisions being imposed which undermined popular support for the governments and even for the concept of democracy. So what we say in this legislation, and I know the President raised some concerns about it, there is a constitutional issue here, we think we are very clear, when the Congress of the United States authorizes activity that will reduce revenue to the government, not by an enormous amount, as the gentleman from Connecticut mentioned, but we are talking here about revenues, when we say we are willing to forgo some of these revenues because we think much more good will come from forgoing them than we could do with collecting them in this situation because of the need for stability and peace in the world, we have a right to set the terms under which it happens, and we say in here that there shall be no intrusion into the democratic processes. We also say, and it is perfectly consistent, we do insist that there be democratic processes. This is not a bill that says no conditions. It sets conditions. The conditions are democracy. The conditions are no corruption, transparency and democracy in the sense of votes and democracy in the sense of free speech and democracy in the sense of people knowing what is happening. We do say we want a framework of honesty and openness, which hasn't always been there. We will talk a little bit later about some of the differences about interpretation of that. Essentially it goes in the right direction. I do want to note, this is a decision that it is not appropriate in the guise of providing financial assistance for international institutions or other governments to dictate to the recipient government issues that ought in a normal society be the subject of a democracy. I repeat my gratitude that we have got broad support for this. I think there is an overwhelming consensus that reducing the debt of those countries which are trying to do the right thing for their people is, of course, primarily in the interest of the poor children and the other poor people in those countries, but also in our interest in trying to promote a stable and peaceful world.

Mr. FRANK of Massachusetts. Mr. Chairman, In consultation with the minority, I ask unanimous consent that the amendment be amended.

Mr. FRANK of Massachusetts

Mr. FRANK of Massachusetts. We have had a problem in the world of economic growth occurring in ways that shut out a great majority of the people in various countries from the benefit. We need a coordinated strategy so that we can have growth, but we can have growth in an equitable way. Debt relief is an essential part of that overall strategy. I thank the gentleman.

Mr. FRANK of Massachusetts

Mr. FRANK of Massachusetts. If the gentleman will yield to me, I haven't looked at that part. I was addressing the assertion that it raises taxes in this current year.